The Blood Brotherhood
by SQUIB24
Summary: This is the first chapter of the story I'm writing. I can tell you, whoever is reading, it's not perfect and I promise there will be punctuation and grammatic errors. If you, who's reading it, liked or disliked it, please leave a comment or two. thanks  D
1. Chapter 1

The Blood Brotherhood

A new generation

**Chapter 1**

My world and life has always been a bit out of the ordinary. I was born in the heart of England: London. After my freshmen year in high school the cost of living in the city began to be a little much for my family, until my dad was offered a job in Toronto Ontario, Canada. We moved out to Toronto about half way through my sophomore year, which took a big toll on me. Leaving my friends behind and moving to the other side of the world seemed both exciting and nerve racking.

While my parents and some movers rushed in and out of new two story house, I began to walk around the neighborhood at an attempt to gain my bearings and possibly meet some of the neighbors. While walking around with my hands in my pockets I started to think of how I might actually like it here. The air felt cleaner with a comfortable cool breeze rustling the nearby leaves on trees making the left over snow that hadn't melted yet fall to the ground in a splatter of white. The further I walked more and more people were outside doing all sorts of things from playing soccer, basketball, baseball, and tons of other activities. Some little kids probably no more than ten years old looked over at me with a confused look on their faces, but I just smiled back at them.

"Hey! Who are you?" one boy ran up to me followed by his fellow players.

"I'm Jason, Jason Castore. I moved in down the street just today." they all had the same look on their faces, there's a new kid.

"So you're the new kid here huh? Where you from?"

"London, England. Can any of you hear my accent?" a few nodded at this.

"So whats there to do here-" I was cut of from a blonde girl shouting and running down the nearby lawn to my right.

"Timmy what are you doing? What would mom think if she saw you or any of you talking to a stranger?" she ran up to the boy I had been talking to, grabbed his arm in such force he made a squinting look. She then pushed herself between me and the boy named Timmy and staring at me with some accusing look like I was some kind of serial killer.

"Who are you and what are you doing here?" I could smell the aroma of strawberry as she spoke, yet she was not chewing gun or sucking on a mint.

"I'm Jason Castore, I just moved in down the street today. I'm sorry if I might have scared you but I wanted to walk around and maybe to talk to some neighbors and get to know what goes on around here." I tried to sound as innocent as I ever could. This blonde girl was very pretty and I didn't want to get off on the wrong foot on my first day here.

"Jason eh? Well welcome to Toronto, or the outskirts more like," she pushed Timmy away and pushed on my shoulder making me move in the opposite direction of the little boys. "I'm guessing you'll want a tour of the place then huh?"

We walked around the neighborhood for a good two hours while she explained things here and there, telling me who lives where, who to look out for and more. By the time seven o'clock rolled around the sun was beginning to set into an orange horizon making our surroundings flash with an orange glow that seemed to set in as if the color of the sun was melting into the air.

As we came up to the driveway where the boys had been playing soccer earlier, Timmy came through the garage followed by his parents. The father looked kind of like the Pillsbury dough boy with a tan, and the mother was skinny but had the look of a mother eagle whose babies are being threatened.

"Katie! Who is this?" the mother came down the driveway at a quick pace and stood between Katie and I as if I was going to stab her or something.

"I'm Jason Castore. I just moved in down the street today, your daughter was just showing me around the neighborhood." once again I tried to sound as innocent as possible, not wanting to offend anyone on my first day here, although it seems everyone thinks I'm some kind murderer.

"Oh, so you're the Castore family we've been hearing about. Well, welcome to Toronto and make sure to tell your parents if you need help at all anyone here will be more then happy to help. Also make sure you're inside your home before dark hits, we've had some unexplained attacks around here and Toronto. Well good night Jason, you and Katie will be able to hang out more tomorrow." with that she took Katie's arm and they all walked back into the house leaving me staring around at the neutral grayness turning darker by the second. But it wasn't the darkness that scared me it was the claustrophobic feeling that started taking over, along with the feeling of being watched.

"Hey! Mum, dad, I'm back!" I called into a dark living room full of boxes the second I stepped in the front door. It was so quiet, too quiet. I was astonished as I made my way through the maze of boxes in the living room and into the kitchen, "Hello?" I called again, this time with an eerie feeling and the hair on my neck standing up.

No answer, just silence. Who know silence could be so deafening?

I tiptoed through the rest of the kitchen, seeing by the flood of moonlight from the kitchen window. Still nothing or no one, "Where the hell are you guys?" I said to myself suppressing a shiver of fear. I came to a dark looking door hidden in the darkness that I guessed to either be the pantry or the basement entrance. Out of complete involuntary movement I pulled on the handle, creaking as it opened and blasting me with an ocean of cold air making me shiver to the bone.

"Jason! Is that you?" it sounded like my dad calling from within the cold darkness.

"Dad?" my voice cracked as I called.

"Oh thank goodness! We've been stuck down here for about an hour, the door wouldn't budge." I felt a wave of relief pass over when the footsteps of my parents called up to me, "So where have you been all this time?" he asked embracing me in an ice cold hug.

"I've been walking around the neighborhood with Katie. She gave me a tour of the neighborhood and told me a little about how school's like here." I said trying to push my dad away, as my mum appeared in the doorway, "Oh, and her parents told me to warn you guys about not going out at night for some reason, I didn't bother asking why though."

"That's ok. Once we get the power on here tomorrow morning we're going to have a barbeque, a kind of meet the new neighbors thing. Plus you can talk more with this Katie girl while we meet her parents."

For the next hour we searched aimlessly through boxes looking for some kind of blanket, sleeping bag or pillow so we could somewhat sleep tonight. Luckily I found a small pillow and a soccer ball patterned fleece blanket, while my dad just has a comforter and a sweater and my mom: one of my other fleece blankets and a flattened box.

I woke the next morning with a burst of sunlight blinding me and the aroma of sausage, eggs, and buttered toast arousing my nostrils. I pushed the blanket off of me feeling around for something to grip on to, to pull me up. There were no boxes. I opened my eyes for a split second before slamming them shut, but I noticed in the split second that they were positioned against the walls and under the window.

"Well look who's finally awake! We got power on before any of us were awake, " my mom said taking the blanket off and folding it. "Breakfast is ready for you."

"Ugh.. Ok.." I moaned, half forcing myself up. Apparently my brain hasn't even turned on yet.

Making my way into the white walled kitchen I noticed opened boxes on the counters and my dad organizing things from them. Near the end of the kitchen, opposite the basement door, lay 3 paper plates: one with eggs, one with sausage, and the last with buttered toast and ketchup next to the toast.

"I see you're not completely awake, moving around like a zombie and all." my dad laughs, putting some jars in a top cupboard.

"Can you blame me after last nights sleep? I'll be happy to get my room made up at least this morning." I took a paper plate and covered it with the works, covering my eggs with ketchup.

"Well have fun with that," he pulled a knife holder out and put the holder in a top cupboard, "Say you going to be upstairs all day or you going to come down to our barbeque for a bit?"

"It won't take me all day to make up my room, dad. I'm not that slow." I said pulling a stool up to the bar sort of thing we had going at the end of the kitchen. To my left was the backdoor leading to the backyard, to my right a short hall to the living room and stairs, to my back is another door leading to god knows what. Whoever designed the house to where part of the basement was under the backyard didn't seem very smart to me, but hey I probably would have done the same thing.

"Well knowing you, you'll be up there until midnight trying to make everything perfect!" he laughed.

"Shut up…" I couldn't think of a comeback because the truth was: I do want to make my bedroom perfect. So I let him have the satisfaction. "Ok, you got me there." then I dug into my breakfast.

Hours later I had almost all my things in my room, my bed had be placed there since last night all that needed to be done was put the sheets and things on it. Why they didn't say I had the mattress and all that last night I couldn't figure out, so I gave up on thinking of a reason and set my mind to making my room _perfect._

My wooden floored room seemed really big when I walked into it empty, but now, with posters, tables, TV, computer, and other things scattered around it seemed smaller. I had two windows on the back wall of my room. When I walk into my room my bed is in the opposite corner from the door, next to one of the windows. My 32" HD TV, playstation 3, my stereo and a flood of wirers 5 feet from the door sitting on a huge black unit that I guessed was also moved in here last night. Opposite my bed lay my oak brown wooden computer desk, filled with everything any computer geek could want, although I hardly use anything special but the pc. Next to the computer desk was my very awesome walk in closet, which now held all my clothes and still only half full.

Now that I had put everything I wanted to in its place I decided to slide down the railing of the stairs, "Hey, anyone home?" I called as I jumped off the banister.

There was no answer, but there were voices coming from the back and the front door lay wide open. "The barbeque, I totally forgot!" I turned the corner and made for the backyard where it seemed every neighbor we had stood conversing amongst themselves.

"Jason! Over here!" Katie came running and gave me a leaping hug as I stepped through the back door into the blazing sun above.

"Hey, how long have you been here? Looks like everyone's here." I stared around while she collected herself from the sudden leap onto me.

"Only like twenty minutes or less. Your parents said you were upstairs decorating your room and offered I could come and surprise you but I decided not to disturb you. Hey let me introduce you to some of the other kids that live around here." she said grabbing my arm and pulling around the yard, introducing me to every teenager she knew that went to the school I'll be starting on Monday.

After about an hour of green grass crunching under our feet from running around meeting every person I was most likely to meet in some class I started to think I'd like it here. Despite the long time, it wasn't actually meeting him or her, it was oh hey this is John, or this is Mary, and then 5, 10 minutes of Katie talking.

I met John, a brown haired brown eyed, sixteen year old muscular hockey and soccer player who loves to party. Mary, a seventeen year old red head, who is on the lacrosse team and apparently just broke up with John (Katie nudged my arm when Mary announced this making my face go hot). Next there was James and Carly, who were twins age sixteen and both were on the soccer teams. James was a blonde haired blue eyed skinny kid, whereas Carly was a dark brunette with blue eyes and had a body of swimmer instead of soccer player.

"There are a few more that live here I know, but if I know them right they're at home playing some war game online or something." we walked back into the house to shelter from the crowd outside. "So, what do you think of the people you met just now?" she looked at me with such curious eyes trying to probe my thoughts out of my head before the words came out my mouth.

"I don't know them well enough, I mean we're just meeting each other. But John seems cool, Mary's really pretty and easy to talk to it seems, James and Carly seem nice and easy going for soccer players." I stopped immediately as Mary had walked into the kitchen trying look like she was looking for something but I knew she wanted to zoom in on me before anyone else could.

"Hey, Mary. Jason thinks you're really pretty." Katie said as Mary cautiously made her way into the kitchen as if she'll step on a wrong piece of wood and it'll explode. I began to turn red and I knew they both could see because I could feel my faces temperature rising rapidly.

"Does he really?" she looked at Katie then at me, "You think I'm pretty do you?" she said, her warm breath spilling over my neck making my hair stand up and my face turn bright red.

"He does. He told me when we were coming in here and I asked him what he thought about everyone he'd met." Katie said, which didn't really help me in my predicament. I haven't even started school here and I already have a crush on someone.

"Well maybe we should hang out more! Say Katie you didn't answer me Friday about coming to the church yard Thursday night, you in?" Mary said with such an excited look on here face.

"Yeah, I'll come." Katie answered then looked at me, "Oh, do you want to join in on our little get together Thursday night?" she asked, I guessed she saw the curiosity in my eyes. "We're going to all meet at this abandoned house somewhere in Toronto, light about 20 candles and each of us is going to tell a scary story. When each story is told then that person blows out their candle, when every candle is blown out it's supposed to open a portal to the spirit world." she had such an excited look on her face and her eyes shone with anticipation.

"Seems like a spooky night!" I said trying to keep my voice from shaking out of the sudden excitement that just washed over me.

"Not scared are you?" Mary popped her head next to my right cheek, her dark red hair flowing over her right shoulder.

"Me? No, I just hope my parents will let me go since I'm new here they might not want me out after dark or something, I don't know." I wanted to jump out of my chair to run and ask my parents to let me go.

"Mary, time to go get your brother!" her mother, an almost albino looking skinny women, called to us.

"Ok then, that's settled. We have our twentieth person now, hopefully everyone else will accept you." Mary said then turned on her heel, red hair flowing in every direction, chase after her mother, who I noticed wasn't followed by a father figure.

"Does she not have a dad?" I whispered to Katie as they walked through the open front door into the burning sun once again.

"No, well yeah, it's confusing. She has a dad, yes, but he lives in Europe with some other women. She's only seem him about three times her whole life."

"Wow, that must be hard…" I felt bad for Mary now.

"She seems to get by without him. Her and her mom are very close, if she's not shopping with friends she's with her mom. So it's not all bad I guess."

A few minutes later it seemed that more people were leaving some for some kind of family affair which made me think; either they were telling the truth or they didn't like us just yet. Maybe there was some kind of neighborly order that has to accept you or something before everyone likes us.

"Say, you ready for school Monday?" Katie asked getting up from her seat and striding over to the hallway.

"Oh god no, I don't even have any supplies. Well I have a few things from back in London, but I don't know what I need here…" now a feeling shock crashed down on me like a wave on a surfer.

"Don't worry about that, that's the best part of being a new kid. You get to come the first few days without knowing anything that happens or having anything ready, you just get to know everything until you settle into the grove of things." she looked toward to front door and stepped toward it then looked back at me, "Well I have to go, my parents are waiting in the front. I'll see you tomorrow? Since we still have one more day until school starts!" and she was gone out the front door before I even stepped into the hallway.

Later that night I was making some changes to my room, which seemed like a total mess. It was as if a tornado has come through here sometime during the day. I moved posters around, moved my bed in a different position, along with my TV set, and a few other bits here and there. I decided I wanted to paint my room either dark red; like blood, or black. My favorite color by far would have to be black.

"Changing up your room again?" my dad asked stepping in cautiously as if a snake was going to bite him.

"Yeah, when I came up it seemed like mess from when I first did it this morning," I said turning to face him. His face was wrought with splotches of red and darker red from sunburn.

"Well you have fun with that. How do you think the barbeque went today?" he came and sat on my bed, which creaked under his weight.

"I don't know. You guys were the ones down there. I only came out and met all the teens around here, or most of them I think. They all seem pretty cool and nice, especially that Mary girl." I felt kind of hot under my cheek, I couldn't believe I just told me dad I had a thing for some girl I just met a few hours ago.

"Is she the one with a widow mother? The red head one right?" he wrinkled up his forehead trying to remember. I just nodded thinking I didn't need to explain anymore to him, "She seems like a nice girl, her mother is very nice. She also offered us over for dinner Friday night."

"Well that should be fun, just don't embarrass me dad." I looked at him with my best puppy-eye impression, he always fell for it.

"Don't worry Jason, if you like her I won't do anything to _embarrass_ you." then the bed creaked as he got up and walked out, "Night JC"

"Night, dad"

Despite lying in bed until about midnight with my eyes heavy as stone, I still wouldn't fall asleep. I wanted to so bad, I was tired, and my head was kind of throbbing. But it was as if some unearthly power kept me awake as if by probing my mind.

I decided to get up and move around. Maybe stretching my legs and getting some blood flow throughout my body will help give me that last bit of energy out. I moved around my room making an extra effort to stretch everything from my toes to my neck, then laid back down. Even still I couldn't sleep. Now I knew it was hopeless, so I turned to face my window so I could stare out at the stars and maybe I'll fall asleep counting among the many thousands of stars. But when I turned to my window it wasn't bright white glows of stars I was counting but instead I was counting little red orbs not much bigger than a marble. There were 6 of the little red orbs.

"What the…" the 6 orbs moved closer and I began to see some white among all the red, faces. "Holy shit!" I fell off my bed in fear of what kind of creatures were sitting, standing or whatever they were doing outside my window.

I lifted my head from the floor to see if they were still there. They were. Although, they just seemed to float there silently, those red orbs which I guess were their eyes, seemed to be controlling me in some way, because I soon found myself standing up and moving around my bed to the window! The closer I came I noticed their skin shine in the moonlight and long canine teeth protrude from their upper gums when they opened their mouths in the way a lion would before devouring its prey.

_NO, STOP! STOP MOVING JASON! DO NOT OPEN THE WINDOW! _A voice in rang deep in my head, bringing me back to reality with my hand lying on the window handle.

The next moment happened so fast I couldn't completely take it all in until after it happened. Those red eyes turned coal black instantly, their mouths opened to make the most unbearably screech no teenage was ever meant to hear. The glass of the window shattered easily into a thousand pieces and flew at me like tiny daggers, making me fall to the ground. I stared at the window in disbelief wondering why they haven't come in yet even with the glass broken littering my floor.

My head dropped to the cold wooden floor and I lost consciousness before I could see them evaporate into the cold darkness of the night.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

"Jason! Jason, wake up!" I could hear a faint voice call my name, but who was calling me? And why was the call so faint?

I felt like I was chilled to the bone when I regained some consciousness. I opened my eyes to see blurs of the two people standing over me but I couldn't process who or what they were.

"Jason!" again they called. This time one of them gripped my shoulders with hot tipped fingers that dug into me and started to shake me to no end. I felt like a rag doll thrown in a blender.

"Dad…" even despite using all my energy that's all I managed to utter and pathetically at that.

"Oh God Jason, you're alive! You're so cold and your skin is so pale I thought you might have gone into a comma or something…" his voice became very shaky and trailed off. Next minute I could feel water drop onto me as he pulled me to his burning hot chest.

"Ah dad stop, you're so hot.. It hurts…" I was gasping for air now, I didn't know how long he'd been squeezing the life out of me in this bear hug.

He let go, "Oh, sorry," then I began to rub my eyes in some chance that I would regain my eyesight. I opened my eyes again to a blinding white light with two reddish white faces staring down at me with bulging brown and blue eyes.

"What happened? Why am I on the floor and so cold?" I began to feel afraid as thoughts of the night past swept into my mind; those glowing red eyes, those brilliantly gleaming canine teeth, those pale faces glowing in the moons radiance. Why were they outside my window? Why did they not come in? Why did they make that bone chilling howl? The chills seemed to run through every vein in my body making me feel cold that no human on earth should feel.

"That's what we're suppose to ask you, and why is your window broken?" my dad had taken to helping my off the floor and down the stairs into the kitchen, where my mum was busy making some hot chocolate and waffles.

"I don't know…" I lied feeling my face go warmer than before. I don't think telling them what really happened would be a wise thing to do. If there was something here that could be a threat to us we would just move again and I didn't want to move again so soon. Even though I've only been here for about a day and a half, I actually kind of like it here already.

"So what do you want for breakfast? I've made just about everything you can think of," my mom said turning around with a plate of scrambled eggs, sausage, hash browns, and toast on the side with pancakes on another plate. "This should give you back your strength from whatever happened last night."

After I had eaten and washed up I took to studying myself in the bathroom mirror. My face was as pale as chalk, with my light golden brown hair draping over my forehead in a mush to the left side. My dark brown eyes seemed lost and distant, I moved in for closer look. The closer I came I noticed a splotch of blood no bigger then the end of a pin on my forehead, forgetting about how weird my eyes looked I wiped the blood off and stuck my finger in my mouth. Despite liking the taste of blood for some weird reason it was a habit of mine to wipe blood off some part of my body and suck it off my finger or my hand.

I searched for a small Band-Aid to cover the cut but came up short after going through every drawer. I decided to put on some clothes before I went to the kitchen to search again.

"Hey mum, do you have any band-aids in the kitchen?" I asked seeing her at the bottom of the stairs walking towards the laundry room to the right.

"There should be some in the cupboard above the toaster, why?" she looked at me in suspicion, like a mother does when a kid lies about doing something wrong.

"I found this cut on my head when I got out of the shower, but I don't know where it came from…" I moved slowly down the stairs.

"Let me see," she reached to move my hair out of the way and looked at my forehead searching for the little cut or some trace of blood, "There's no cut on your forehead, you sure you're not just seeing things?" I pulled my hand up to rub my forehead which I even knew wouldn't do any good trying to find a cut so small.

"No, I wiped some blood off and sucked it off my finger…weird." I had a weird feeling about this but maybe because it was so small it could have healed already. But then I thought no matter how small a cut is it can't heal itself in a matter of minutes.

I couldn't think of any reason why my cut had healed so fast and quite frankly it seemed to irritate me. Could those creatures of night have done something to me? No, they didn't even come in to my room. Could it be magic? No, that's just nonsense. Maybe I have some kind of high level of something that allows me to heal faster than regular. No, there could be no such person that was like Lex Luther, although it seemed a bit intriguing it could not be so. "Ah! This is really annoying me!" I yelled out randomly at my wall.

"What's annoying you?" I turned to see Katie walk in my room. The sight of her in my room made me tense for some reason. I always used to have girls over in London.

"Oh nothing really, it's just I had this cut on my forehead when I got out of the shower and a few minutes later when I went to the kitchen for a band-aid my mum said there wasn't even a bruise there. I've been going over in my mind about what could cause such fast healing," I look down at the floor and shake my head, "Nothing so far…"

"Well maybe you're just special in that way, I mean everyone is unique in some way or form. Speed, smarts, healing, psychic power, you know everyone has their little thing different about them." my bed melted around her as she sat down, "Comfy bed, I like it."

"Thanks, I think that may be the nicest thing that could happen to me today," I said while thinking about what I was going to do today or if my parents had something planned.

"Really, well thanks. Say you know since we have school tomorrow and it's your first day I was wondering if you wanted to go shopping for some supplies?" she had a flicker of excitement in her eyes.

"Sorry, but I don't really feel like going anywhere today, plus I brought my things from London over with me," I really didn't want to blow out that little flame of excitement in her but I really didn't feel like doing anything today.

"Say, have you seen any red eyes floating around outside your window before?" I came out with after an awkward moment of silence.

She made cross motion with her fingers and sort of hissed at me, "We do not speak of such creatures here, especially in this neighborhood, but since you are new I guess I'll be the one to explain a few things." she moved further back onto my bed leaning against the wall making herself more comfortable.

"The things are creatures of the night or what we like to call them, vampires." she made motions with her hands as she spoke.

"Wait, you mean vampires are real and not just some fictional thing we read about in stories? But how can they be real, they defy everything there is about human nature." my mind was spinning with questions and thoughts from stories I'd read in previous years.

"Yep, they're real alright. I know, I hate the concept too but it's not like we can just not believe they're there when they are, always waiting to strike. I think you remember my mom telling you about staying indoors after dark and something about a few attacks that have happened?"

"Yeah I remember someone telling me something about that, but I never really thought about what they were talking about you know?" I now moved to sit against the wall perpendicular to Katie.

"Yeah well, you should start thinking about it now. Especially now, since you know they're real and have witnessed them for yourselves. Well if you're not going to go anywhere today, what are you going to do?"

"I'm not going to get away from you am I?" I joked.

"Nope, sure not. So how about walking around the neighborhood or something? At least you'll be getting out of the house and you're not really leaving the neighborhood too. So how about it?" I could see I wasn't going to win no matter what I said.

"Fine, you win. Let's go walk around then!"

We spent most of the day walking in a giant square talking about almost everything from family to school to sports and everything in between. At around five James and a couple of his friends drove up beside us in a red mustang, "Hey, you guys up for some soccer, or you going to walk around the neighborhood a couple hundred more times?" he sniggered and I could hear his friends in the back start hollering.

"Sure, what you say Katie?" I looked at her to make sure she didn't want to keep walking.

"There's nothing else to do, why not?" she said and James opened the passenger seat where we hopped in for a ride to who knows where.

"Where is there a field or open space?" I asked.

"It's just around the corner, we passed it about five times probably." she laughed pointing to where I guessed we were going.

When we got to the huge field my mouth dropped not only from how open it was but also because of the fact that I didn't notice this before. There were already six people kicking a ball around as we walked onto the field.

"So are the boundaries the same as before? Goals too?" James called over to someone on the other side as one of his friends from the car set up a goal with two orange cones.

"Yep, no out of bounds, except the goals and corners. Who's the new kid?" someone said walking over to us. He was rather more tanned than anyone else I've seen so far.

"He's Jason, the new guy in town," James looked back to me and gave me a questionable look. "You going to play with us?"

"Sure, I used to be one of the best defenders and right forwards back home." I said with pride and to show off in a way, although I would deny it if you asked.

"Oh really? Well this isn't your _back home_. We play a lot of backyard soccer you could say, and the first rule is: there are no rules." the tanned guy said pointing at me then walked back to where his friends or teammates were still kicking the ball around.

"That's John, I think Katie has already told you about him?" James turned to me as his friends moved to mingle with the other guys.

"No, well I know who he is and how he broke up with Mary recently. But other than that I don't know anything else."

"Oh," he looked at Katie with a guilty look. "Well John is a real jackass. The only reason we put up with him is because he is one of our best players on the team. If you are as good as you claim to be, then if coach will let you try for the team, you may just take his position and he'll be put on second string."

"Oh, well I don't want to butt in and change everything…" I felt a sense of pride about how James wanted me on the team and John out.

"Oh come on, did you hear what I just said? He's a jackass! No one likes him, so you would be doing first string a favor for taking him out for us." then he took off to the crowd in the middle of the so called field.

"Well I feel weird, what do I do?" I turned and asked Katie.

"Go play. Who cares if you're better then everyone out there? You're out there to play and have fun." then she waved her arms telling me to go.

"Hey, who's this little shit?" someone on Johns team asked as I came to James side.

"He's the new kid, leave him alone," James said looking to his right then muttered something under his breath.

"So are we keeping same teams or what?" James asked.

"Shit, I only want to play within the official games; we're playing with our own teams." John smirked.

After that I followed James and his team to where we came from to figure out who was going to play what position and to introduce the others to me during the process.

"This is Brandon," James said pointing to a muscular brown haired guy across from me; he looked more like a hockey player then a soccer player. "You're our goalie, as usual."

"Mike," a black haired guy much smaller then Brandon but I could see definition under his T-shirt. "You and Tyler are playing defense." the guy to my left nodded, a blonde guy that was about the same size as me, but his shoulders protruded out a lot more than mine.

"Noah, you, me and Jason here are going to be forwards," James pointed to a curly brown haired guy who seemed smaller then everyone else but he did have some rather large calf muscles, so I guess he was more of a runner then someone who worked on their upper body.

"Time to see what you got Jason!" James said as we took our positions on the field.

For the first thirty minutes the severely intense game stayed zero for both sides. I began to think that Canadians did play harder then Europeans even though I seemed to be lasting longer then everyone else. Maybe European high schools concentrate on endurance so when the other team gets tired they pick up the pace so the other team can't keep up, whereas here it seems they go all out even if they can't put out anymore.

I loved the running back and forth under the quickly dimming sun. It began to get progressively cooler every second the sun dropped, but I grew up playing hard in cold so it helped me as I ran back and forth.

"Alright let's call it quits for now!" James yelled out over the field as the white and black ball went flying towards his mustang.

After an hour and a half of playing, our team came out on top in a two to one lead.

"Well it seems the new kid can hold his own against us," John managed to say between gulping in clumps of air. "But don't think you can last during a real game with us."

"No offense John but seeing as how you're almost about to collapse and I could still go for another game, it think I can outlast you and your team twice as long." I said jokingly.

"Ok the new kid made a joke about you, who cares? Forget it John," James said as John mustered up some strength as he came for me rolling up his sleeves.

"Yeah, Yeah, I don't have any strength left to do anything anyways. I'll give him that joke this time, but next don't think I'll be let you go without a black eye or worse."

"He won't." Katie said taking hold of my right arm.

We waited to get in the trunk as James tossed the cones and balls into the back. The sun was about to dip under the horizon now and James speed to drop Katie and I off at Katie's house.

"See you at school Jason, Katie! I'll tell the coach about you and see if he'll give you a chance on the team." then he was off to drop his other friends off.

"So what do you think about some of the other guys?" Katie asked as I walked her up to her front door.

"They seem cool. Except John, I would like to knock him down just to wipe that stupid little grin off his face. Tyler and me got along real good on the field, reading each other's moves and such. I think it would be fun to play on the same team as James and some of the guys on his team.

"That's good because you'll have to deal with them if you do chance a spot on the team" she said as her mum was now coming to the front door.

"Yeah no kidding." I paused to face the open door, "Hello, uh I never got your last name…" I looked at Katie in confusion.

"Oh dear, you like this boy and he doesn't even know your last name yet! You'll never learn honey." Katie cheeks turned as red as blood, "We're the Jamison's."

"Looks like I got a little pay back from yesterday huh?" I laughed at the thought of how Katie made me blush while telling Mary how I thought she pretty.

"Well you got me this time, but don't expect it to happen again." and with that she snaked inside past her mother without a backward glance or a goodbye.

"Well now that she knows you know her secret she's going to be really shy now. Well goodnight Jason. Be inside your home before the sun fully sets ok? Don't want anything to happen to you in the dark now do we?" she waved me off as she shut the elegant wooden door with stained glass set in the middle.

Looming darkness started to close in around me giving me that claustrophobic feeling again as the sun fell below the horizon. Half of me wanted to run home and escape this danger that I couldn't see but feel and half the other half wanted to searching for whatever was out there feeding me this feeling of danger.

_Hello Jason, how are you on this beautiful night of darkness? _A dark mysterious voice said out of the blue… or black.

"What? Who said that!" a surge of panic and fear rushed through every fiber of my being in milliseconds.

_You don't need to know who I am…yet. Just know that I am watching you. You're different than the rest of them and if you wish to see how you differ from your new found friends, kneel before your window and ask the wind to bring you knowledge beyond the ordinary. Good-bye for now Jason Castore. Remember, I'm watching you. _

I had no reply to this except run full speed to my house and not stop or slow down until I am under my covers inside my room.

"JC, is that?" I heard my dad call from the kitchen as I opened and shut the front door.

"Yeah, I'm going to shower and go to bed. Could you bring my dinner up for me?" I called as I started to leap up the stairs two at a time.

I stood right under the showerhead as I did every time, allowing hot water to rain on me. I loved hot water. There was nothing I could love more than hot water. Well maybe the taste of blood.

"Did I just think I loved blood more than hot water? That was weird. And why am I talking to myself? Hmm, I maybe going crazy." the more I stood under the hot water the thicker the water seemed to get and thoughts of blood flooded through my mind.

My vision began to blur, muscles tensed up, senses heightened to where I could smell something sweet and sour making me thirsty beyond believe, I could hear my parents footsteps on the kitchen floor as if they were inches from me. My head began to hurt and I could feel liquid come from the roof of my mouth: blood.

"What's going on!" my yelled was muffled from the rush of water coming out of the showerhead.

I slipped out of the shower and bounded to the cold tile floor of the bathroom with a loud boom. I felt like something was taking over my body, making me feel invincible yet falling to floor still hurt and the cold floor chilled through my skin.

I managed to pull myself up to hold onto the bowl of the sink and look at myself in the fogged up mirror. I could make out slits for eyes, high cheekbones, protruding canine teeth, my arms and chest looked bigger as if I'd been taking steroids for weeks. I also had a craving for something thick, something tasty, something full of rich life, and something I knew would never end in supply.

I craved blood.

"What the hell have I become? What the hell did those so called vampires do to me?"

Then I dropped to the floor with a headache strong enough to kill a normal person, but I could feel and see now that I was so different from a normal person. I didn't ask to see how I was different so why was this happening to me?

I closed my eyes and could have sworn I heard a low growl of some large beast faint in my ears as darkness took over for the second time and I lost consciousness.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3 **

_BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! _

It sounded like someone was banging on something, but the sound was so faint I couldn't really tell. Besides the fact that someone was banging on something I had to find out how long I'd been unconscious and how I could explain or come up with a story to tell my parents about why I had been locked in here for who knows how long.

"Jason! Are you ok in there? You've been in there for two hours," ok so I know how long I've been in here, now to come up with a story to tell them.

"Yeah…" wow it hurt to talk! It felt like my lungs were being stabbed with thousands of tiny knives. "I slipped out of the bath and must have hit my head." well that makes me look really stupid, but it'll have to do for now.

"Are you alright though?" my mum called over all the banging that had yet to cease.

"Yeah, just a little headache that's all." I pulled myself against my will to sit against the cold bare wall.

Images of what I saw in the mirror about two hours ago flashed through my head. What the hell was that? Was that even me? I didn't, or couldn't, think about those few seconds I'd seen some wild beast within my reflection.

"Well your dinner is in your room, you sure you're ok?" my mum kept on in her sweet motherly voice.

"Yes mum I'm ok. I don't need any help I just need a few minutes to recuperate myself." I lied, I needed someone to tell me what the hell had happened to me and or why it did.

_You now know what is really behind the masked human you see every day. _That dark deep yet soothing voice came into my head again, _but what you experienced is only the very beginning of what you're coming to learn about yourself. I can help you control yourself, help you grow, strengthen your mind as well as muscle. Come to me and I can give you a gift that will truly make you invincible. All you have to do is allow me access to your room. _

Make me invincible? What was he talking about? I'd briefly thought about if the one speaking in my mind was a male or female and I came to the conclusion that no female's voice had such a dark tone to it.

"No, I don't want to become a vampire! You will never turn me into one of your kind! You hear me!" my voice echoed around within the empty air, making me shiver at the thought that I was somewhat yelling at myself. What else am I suppose to do?

"Jason? What are you yelling about?" my mum's voice sprang me from my little hallucination that had taken over.

"Nothing. Well my head hurts," which wasn't all false, it did hurt from falling out of the tub.

"Ok." then I heard footsteps leaving down the stairs.

"Phew…" I sighed. I couldn't let my parents know that some psycho vampire thing was speaking to me in my mind.

As dressed myself I began thinking about if I should take anything to school tomorrow or wait and see what I'll need first. Along with thinking about what take I noticed that I had a big piece of wood up in the hole where those vampires broke it last night. "Well at least I won't be freezing tonight, that's a plus."

I dived into my bed a few minutes later utterly overtaken by drowsiness that had me snoring within seconds. I began to smell blood, rich and strong like someone had sprayed perfume in my face. I didn't know where I was all I knew was that wherever I was standing or floating it was black as the night sky. "Hello!" I called out with the feeling of emptiness and despair that I knew no one would reply.

_So you have entered our realm now have you? Wish to.. Speed up the process huh? _

"No! Where am I? I don't want to be here! Who are you and what do you want with me?"

_Isn't that obvious, what I want with you? I want to introduce you to the wonders of the night, the craving for blood that gives you strength, the senses that are heightened, the speed of many mustangs. I want you to become a vampire Jason. _

"Why? How am I so special that you choose me over anyone else in the neighborhood?"

_Because you're different! Have you not noticed that since you drank the blood from your forehead? _I thought about what he just said and I started to get the gut wrenching feeling when you know something's wrong but don't know what to do about it. "So wait, when I fell out of the shower I changed into something?" the words came out of my mouth before I even had any time to think about what I was saying.

_Ah, so you have noticed. Well good…before I go I will give you this: you haven't seen even half the extent of what power you have. Thursday is a full moon; at the point where the moon is highest in the sky you transform into what you truly are. _

_ "_What! What do you mean I will transform into what I truly am? Please! Please tell me what's going on, I'm scared and I don't know what's happening." I dropped to my knees and felt red hot tears come flowing into the palms of my hands as if I was positioned right under Niagara Falls.

_ I will give you one last piece of advice: don't try and fight what you really are, it will just cause for pain and suffering before you change. _Then the darkness seemed to engulf and suffocate me. I couldn't see, couldn't breathe, and couldn't move, my screams were choked deep within my throat. Was I dying…?

Or being reborn?

I woke with a start like I'd been shot and sat bolt upright. What just happened? My eyes still hurt from crying, but what he said to me about Thursday, would that come true?

I turned to stare out my window realizing all the millions of questions that were running through my head making me dizzy. I turned around to see my digital clock; 4:07 it read. "God, I have about an hour before I have to get up."

I swung my feet over the side of my bed and rubbed the sweat pouring off my forehead as my feet reached for the bitterly cold floor. I stretched for a few seconds before walking out of my room into the silent hallway leading to the stairs. I didn't want to take a shower incase I woke my parents and I couldn't really do much else at four in the morning.

As I stepped onto the ground floor my eyes were fixed on the front door. It was open. "What the hell? Why is the front door open?" I moved to close it but before I could I saw something move at lightning speed which made me surprised I could see it. I ran out into the front yard to see what it was that ran past my house but by the time I got to the sidewalk it disappeared.

"Jason, get back inside! Hurry before they get you!" a female voiced called but I didn't get a chance to reply or even turn to see where it the call had come from before someone's grabbed my shoulder.

"This one smells different from the rest of them…" I heard the thing that grabbed me and sniffed my neck say. The voice was rather rough and hoarse as if he'd been scratching at the throat. "What do I do with him?" a surge of fear swept through me in seconds as the things hand gripped harder.

"Leave him…for now…" and the hand was gone. I didn't know what had just happened and I felt paralyzed from fear. After a minute or two I managed to turn around to see three things that looked human, but moved with the wind.

"Oh my God, Jason honey are you alright?" the same female voice echoed around in my head again but this time there was contact.

"Huh?" I turned to see Katie's mum holding me at arm's length as if I had some kind of deadly disease.

"Were you attacked by them? Are you ok?"

"Yes, yes I'm fine. What were those things? They looked human but moved faster than any person on earth…" my skin started producing goose bumps as the windswept over my hot sweaty body, I must have sweat without realizing it when I was paralyzed by fear.

"Their vampires honey. Vile creatures that have to kill to survive…" she stopped and let go of me as if someone had put a gun to her head, and then ran back to her home.

"Man some people here are really weird." I knew about vampires, almost everything about them, including many myths as well. I just always thought they were something in fairytales to scare and entertain kids and adults.

The wind started to pick making me wrap my arms around my shoulders. I didn't know how much time had passed since I came outside but since being completely engulfed in fear, you kind of lose track of time, so I made my way back into the house making sure I shut the front door for good this time.

I looked upstairs to see if a light had been turned on signaling the awake of my parents. They were still asleep, so I moved into the kitchen to make some breakfast.

"Ah, the good old toast with peanut butter and jam sandwich for breakfast. Easy and it fills you up." I took my time making breakfast so I could have something other to think about then the whole fiasco that had just occurring about… I don't even know how long. I looked over at the microwave; 4:43. "No way all that took about thirty minutes." and I mouthed wow as the toast popped up.

"What are you doing up so early?" my dad said through a long awaited yawn.

"I could ask you the same thing; I didn't see a light on so I figured you guys were still asleep." I heard him yawn again.

"I didn't want to wake your mother. Uh Jason, what's that on your shoulder?" oh god, oh god what's on my shoulder?

"What do you mean? There's nothing on my shoulder or I don't think there is. It's probably just some dust or something." I couldn't think of what could possibly be on my shoulder, except if that vampire that had his hand on my shoulder had something in his palm…oh god…

My dad touched wiped my shoulder and an aroma quickly filled my nostrils and clouded my thoughts, "Is this blood?" he sniffed the fresh blood on his fingers, "Jason what have you been doing?"

"Nothing…well yeah, I haven't done anything but would you believe me if I told you a vampire grabbed me by the shoulder and he had fresh blood in his palm?" he looked at me like I'd lost my mind.

"Jason, what are you talking about? You're not losing your mind are you, I mean it's ok if you need help, all you need to do is say and we'll get you a doctor or something." great now my dad thought I was psycho! How the hell am I going to make him believe me?

"No dad I don't need help and I'm not losing my mind. I'm fine, but if you won't believe me then you won't know what I'm going through." hopefully that would make him back off.

"Ok, ok, I'll leave you alone," yes it worked! "But if you need any help you know what to do." and he walked out of the kitchen with his chin up but it seemed like he'd just lost a war, a war that has only just begun.

This morning was turning into almost a nightmare it seemed: vampires taking away someone, not to mention one had a grip on me but decided to let me go for some reason, Katie's mum had been outside during all this, and my dad seemed to acting a little off. Why did I change in the bathroom last night? Why were those vampires talking to me through my mind and asking me to become one of them?

"Man I hope my first day at school in Canada goes better then the past few hours…"

"Hey, anyone home? Jason you still here?" someone called from the front door just as I started putting on my favorite blue and gold under armor under a blue collared shirt with gold stripes and a pair of beige cargo shorts.

"Yeah, hold on a sec." I didn't even know who I was yelling to. "Who's down there?" I called while trying to find a pair of flip flops.

"Ha-ha, its James you idiot," he said stepping through my door. I didn't even hear him come up the stairs, maybe my new senses are failing me (so much for being different, well my head was stuffed inside my closet so maybe that would explain a bit). "I came to give you a ride man, Katie, Carly, and Mike are already in the car. Sorry but you'll have to squeeze between Katie and Mike." he gave me a little sympathetic shrug of the shoulders.

"That's cool, I know Katie but I might be a bit uncomfortable being so close next to Mike." I don't really know why I just said that, it just came out and it was to late to change that.

"Don't worry, Mike's cool. Plus if coach likes you after school today you'll most likely be one of us and maybe get rid of John for us."

"Wait, did you just say if coach likes me after school? I don't even get a chance to settle in before I think about even wanting to try out?" I sounded more aggressive then I had wanted to.

"Yeah, plus if he does like you the guys you met yesterday will all put in a good word for you, and if you make it on the team you'll fit in ten times faster. Trust me."

"Alright, I trust you. Well, let's get this first day of Canadian high school over with." we both laughed as I held the front door open for him. "Bye mum, dad!" I called to an empty looking house. Where had my parents gone? It wasn't like my dad to be late for work let alone just not go, and my mum, well she was always up before me to make me breakfast. James's mustang glistened in the dull light of the morning sun making it look like a subdued fire.

"I don't think anyone's home man. Nice under armor shirt." Mike said opening the door for me.

"Yeah sure looks like it, thanks." Mike looked like an Asian that just woke up, his black hair all tousled and out of place everywhere. Katie on the other hand looked well groomed and made up like she was ready to go to prom in a T-shirt and jeans. I couldn't see who sat in the passenger side but he was staring out the window in searching intently for something. James looked just like he did yesterday during the soccer game, hair all over the place as if he'd stuck his head out the window on the highway. I soon realized that his window always stayed down.

"So what's the school like here?" I asked looking around to see if anyone would answer.

"It's just like your typical high school with a twist. You know jocks, nerds, Goths, emos, preps, normal kids who aren't into any kind of group, the druggies, and then you got the staff. You'll learn fast who's in what clique." he paused for a second so he could turn out of the neighborhood and onto a road that led to the highway. "You'll be one of us pretty quick."

I guess what he meant by "us" is that I'll become a jock for that fact that I'll be playing soccer. I didn't really care what so called "clique" I was in, I just wanted to play soccer and fit in. I didn't bother to ask what the twist was that he referred to.

The ride into Toronto was a rather quiet one, despite the whistle of wind flying by going 100kmh and a car full of teenagers. My mind seemed to race by like the railings of the highway as we passed them, thinking about starting a new school made me feel a bit awkward. I'll be called the "new kid" and who knows what else kids can make up, and I don't want to know what some of them can think up. Would anyone besides who I already know accept me? What would they think of me? I wasn't really one to be nervous about changing schools, but back in Europe my skill in soccer had been well known so if someone didn't know who I was they would learn pretty fast. But here I'm in a completely different country, a different continent.

"The school is just around the corner Jason." James said turning a corner. Thoughts were buzzing around in my head so much I didn't even notice we had arrived at the school let alone in Toronto city limits.

"Shit…" was all I could manage. The school looked more like a university campus instead of a high school. We passed a fenced in football field that glowed green from the sunlight bouncing off the dew covered grass. I had to squint as the sun bounced off the huge aluminum bleachers, they looked big enough to hold easily over 100 people. Around the field I saw some students in sweats running on a night black track. To the left of the field lay the enormous grounds of the brick red school.

"Big isn't it? Don't worry, if you stick to the map you get you won't get lost." James said turning into a sea of shining parked cars. "Crap, looks like we came a bit late. Want me to let you guys off at the front?"

"Hey, don't scare the kid already James! Let him get used to the school and things then start messing with him." the kid next to him chuckled.

Katie hit him in the shoulder then he gave her a confused look, "Yeah don't scare him, and yes, _I_ would like to be let off at the front."

Before I had a chance to think about how people will think of me I was being shoved out of the car by Katie. I stood in the cool morning air staring at my huge new school, which had about a 100 students pushing and shoving each other to get through the front doors.

"And my day of high school in a different country starts." I sighed

"Oh you'll have fun, trust me." Katie grabbed my arm, "I'll take you to the front office to get your schedule and map. And James was right, until you get used to the school you're going to have to use the map or you'll get lost." then I was buried into an ocean of unfamiliar faces and smells.


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

As Katie hauled me passed hundreds of kids standing at their lockers through the school to the front office I began to wonder what it was that I smelled everywhere. At first I thought I was just smelling way more colognes and perfumes then I'd ever smelled in my life but then I thought, what I'm smelling is richer, sweeter, thicker…as if I smelled the blood of every person that surrounded me walking through the hall.

"I think the principal will want to talk to you after you get your schedule and all." she said gently shoving some kid into his locker so we could get by.

"Why would he want to see me?" even within all this traffic of kids and my arm being pulled in the right direction I still had a hard time keeping up with her.

"He usually likes to talk to new students. He's really nice, so you don't need to worry yourself about him. Just act normal and relaxed and you'll be fine." she made a sharp turn which almost made me hit the corner face first. "Here we are!" and I ran into her not noticing that she had suddenly stopped facing a brown door that had "office" written in bold black letters. The door was strictly solid brown wood, not like other doors with blurred windows. "Well, this is where I leave it to you." she gave me a quick hug and added, "Don't worry, they'll take care of you."

"Ok, I guess I'll see you somewhere sometime today?"

"Maybe, who knows, we may have some classes together!" then she gave me another quick hug and ran off down the opposite direction we came from, disappearing into the ocean of bodies again.

"Now or never, Jason." and I opened the door to the office.

Inside looked just like your typical secretaries room, a wooden desk with a women sitting behind it arguing with another women and her daughter about something, a few students and their parents sitting on both sides of the door to which I had just entered. Leading behind the secretaries were two similar brown wood doors that fell about five feet apart with "Men's principal" on one and "Women's Principal" on the other. This seemed very strange to me.

At the front desk stood what I guessed to be a mother and her daughter. The girl was very short if she was around my age, let alone to be going to this school, but she was very cute. She had shoulder length brown hair and from what I could tell from here, green eyes.

Out of pure embarrassment I turned and pretended that I was studying a picture next to the women's principal door.

"Are you new here too?" she asked in a quiet dreamy voice.

"Yeah. You too?" I whispered back as she moved back beside me as slow as a sloth so her mother wouldn't notice her sudden movement, but she seemed so preoccupied as to even notice if dynamite exploded right in front of her.

"Yeah, and my mom's having a fit about going here. I don't know why though, the people I've met that go here seem very nice."

"No kidding, I moved here last Friday and I already know most of the guy's soccer team and a few others."

"Yeah, so what are you?" she asked with an excited look.

"What am I? What do you mean?" I had no clue what she could possibly be talking about.

"Oh, you don't know yet. Well you'll find out soon enough." she winked at me, "Oh, and my name's Clary."

"Jason."

"Well I hope to see you around, Jason." then she moved up beside her mother at the same sloth like speed as before.

"Let's go Clary, these people don't know what they're talking about!" and her mother grabbed her arm and dragged from the room before she even had a chance to make a sound.

"Can I help you?" the secretary said rubbing her eyes in relief that the women was finally gone. She had brown hair that lay in long curls, a green shirt with a brown shawl wrapped around her shoulders.

"I'm Jason Castore, I'm new." I couldn't think of any other way to put it. I looked down at a triangular name plate that read, "Ex. Secretary, Mrs. Jones"

"Ah yes, Jason, we've been expecting you." what? How could they be expecting me? "Castore you said?" she asked as she ruffled through a pile of beige folders.

"Yes, may I ask how you've been expecting me?"

"Ah, here we are," she pulled out a beige folder with my name on it that held some papers which I guessed to be my schedule and map of the school. "Dr. Que asked me to send you to his office when you arrived, he wants to speak to you." she pointed to my left, "His office is through that door. Don't be shy Jason, he's very nice."

I moved to my left turning back to look at the other students waiting to be seen. The guys sitting one side didn't seem to look much older than me, but were much bigger and darker. Their eyes, I swear, looked like slits. On the other side sat girls whose skin glowed just the same as Clary's had, their eyes were normal though.

Weird, I thought to myself as I opened the door to Dr. Que's office. His office was more or less the same layout as the room before it, brown wooden desk in the middle with a triangular name plate, folders scattered in various places, a few filing cabinets in the corners, pictures of family or friends hung within inches of each other, and a large glass window covering the back wall to which Mr. Que was gazing out.

"Hello, Jason. Take a seat." he said in a strong yet gently voice without turning his attention from the outside world.

After a minute or two he finally turned from the window to reveal a tall well built man who looked to be in his late thirties or early forties. He had a head covered in disheveled brown hair, a scruffy but well kept face. His eyes were an off blue with a black slit down the center of both. He wore a brown suite that fit to show off how much muscle he had that would otherwise be hiding from the world.

"Do you know what this school is, Jason?" his voice sounded through the trance I had been under while evaluating my new principal.

"Sir? Isn't it just like any other high school?" padded black computer chair behind the desk creaked as he sat down.

"We tend to think so, yes, but in reality, it isn't like any other high school anywhere." he paused to link his fingers together across his chest.

"I'm not following you…" I said after a few seconds of awkward silence waiting for him to say anything.

"Jason, how do I put this…?" he placed his hands with fingers still linked on the desk, "This is a school for half-breeds, if you will." then he looked at me with a most warming smile someone like him could have ever produced.

"What exactly do you mean by _half-breeds_?" this wouldn't process with my brain, it wouldn't go through, like a worm virus trying to infect a computer with various firewalls set up to protect against it.

"Vampires, werewolves, and mutants if you will." he looked at me with an excited look and his face lit up like a fat kid in a candy shop, I could tell he hadn't told this story in a while.

"I would be freaking out at what you just said if I hadn't experienced vampires first hand. As for the werewolves I'm not so sure, and what exactly do you mean by mutants?" I felt calm for someone sitting in my situation, talking about a school for vampires, werewolves, and mutants (whatever they were).

"Mutants aren't necessary a derogatory term because their genes are mutated so that's exactly what they are," I must have had a dumbfounded look on my face because he continued his lecture. "We don't know how it's done but it is. What we do know is that the mutation is passed down from generation to generation. Say if your father was mutant of fire, you would also have the mutation of fire, and your son will have the mutation. Does that help explain it?"

My mind was being challenged by everything I've learned back in England and what I was learning now didn't seem to want to settle in my brain. "It makes sense for the most part, so what you're saying is that someone can control or manipulate fire to however their will is satisfied?" this is what boggled my mind the most.

"Yes, and there are more than just the main elements. We have students who control weather, manipulate other people's minds, and in few rare cases some have sprouted wings." he paused for second to let that last one sink in. I really couldn't understand what was happening to me, a month ago I had been like any other regular high school soccer player and student, now I'm being hurtled into a world of such things that I have only read about or seen in movies. This was cool!

His chair let out a sigh as air refilled the padding when he got up, "Lets take a tour, shall we?" he moved around me over to open the door for me.

I followed him out of the office into the secretary room where the students who sat there before were still seated, they didn't seem to care that one of their principals was striding past them. I began to wonder if all the guys eyes in this school were slits and why were the girls normal?

"You may wonder why the men of this school, theirs eyes are slits and the women's are not?" he asked stepping in the empty corridor to which stood hundreds of students just minutes before.

"Yeah, how did you know?" I closed the office door behind me. I wonder if he can read my mind.

"I can't read your mind if that's what you're thinking," he chuckled for a second then continued. "Most new students here notice that and wonder why. Well I'll gladly tell you, most of the men for some reason have that gene for a werewolf passed down from their forefathers, not all men show it though. The gene, or some like to call it a curse, will lie dormant and you can go your whole life without ever wakening it, others find various ways to wake what's hidden within them. Now you'll also notice some males whose eyes are normal, now they are either vampire or haven't woken the gene yet, and those who haven't yet, like I said before, may go their whole lives without ever wakening it." he went silent for a few moments admiring the corridor.

To any other person who came (meaning someone who was pure human) to this school would just think it was a lot bigger and nicer than theirs. The walls were strictly red brick, below our feet lay white marble with golden names listed not inches away from each other. "Why are these names here?"

He turned around and looked down, "They are the names of the headmasters and mistresses that have ruled and protected this school over the past centuries" did he just say centuries? No way has this school been here that long. ". In every wing you'll learn that there are names of those who have mastered in that specific field.

Along the walls pictures were hung of every kind of animal and their masters, "These are the warriors who protected this very school in the past." ok now I was confused.

"What do you mean by protect? Like people tried to burn this place down or something?"

"Yes, and they try to destroy the place and turn it into rubble, but you'll learn about all that in your history class." so there seemed to be more to this place then I had thought. "Now back to the females." he said taking a few strides down the corridor telling me he was ready to move on.

"I'm guessing they're vampires?"

"And you guess right, although like the men they can also be werewolves too."

"But how come their eyes are normal and not slits?"

"That is because vampires are more human then creature." a thought struck me from a book I read a while back that said vampires are only undead humans, whereas werewolves are a completely different breed/species.

"Well ok, I can understand that, but what about mutants? What's their role here?" even though he explained mutants control elemental powers of the planet, the thought of mutants still made me think of X-men.

"Mutants are more human than anything, just with a bit extra power to them. Most normal societies don't accept them, saying they're a danger and so they end up here or in some other school closer to where they live."

"You mean there are more schools then this one?"

"Oh yes, not too many but there are more." he paused to take a few deep breathes, "Well I think you'll learn more during class time, how about I tell you about the school now and give you a grand tour of the place?"

Not like I could refuse and I had no intention of going to class anytime soon.

I soon learned there were four wings to the school: north, south, east, and west. Each wing had its own purpose, like the west wing (the one we were in) was the office and personal records wing, with a few classrooms. Mr. Que wouldn't tell me what each wings purpose was and that I had to learn on my own saying, "the only way to learn something is to discover it on your own, everything can't be taught to you."

We continued back the way we came to venture into the east wing. The way the school was laid out confused me to an extent, I understood the school faced north, but wherever you were in the school, how were you suppose to figure out what lay where?

The east wing looked rather the same as the west; red lockers line the walls, white marble floor with names imprinted in gold, same pure wooden doors. The only difference I noticed was the big sign half way down the hall that read "_Medical Hall"_.

"I'm guessing this is the medical wing?" I asked pointing to the sign.

"Very good, although it doesn't take a genius to figure that out," he laughed looking to where my finger pointed to. "Also, you may notice names in gold on the floor just like the other?"

"Yes, I noticed. Are they there for the same reason as the people who protected the school?"

"Sort of, the names here are the names of those who healed and protected the ones who fought for the school." we kept walking down the hall until another wide hall opened up to the right.

"I thought the school was in four wings?" I looked down the connecting hall confused.

"What did you think the school was in the shape of a plus sign or something?" he looked at me with a confused look.

"I don't really know what I thought, but I guess that's what I had in mind…" I felt really stupid now.

"Don't worry about, you'll get to see the whole school soon enough. Now shall we venture upstairs?" he said waving his arm to the left at a white space in the wall.

"There are stairs? But from outside it seemed like only a one story building and what about the rest of the ground floor?" I felt so confused, from the outside only the very middle went higher than the first floor. How could there possibly be more stories to this place, and I wanted to see the rest of the first floor.

"The rest of the bottom floor is just the same as these two," he said motioning with his arms from the medical to the office hallway. "With connecting corridors down each side," he pointed to the hall to our right. "As for the stairs, do you believe in magic my boy?" magic, how could he possibly put magic into my head after everything he told me which I thought only existed in fairy tales do actually exist?

"I don't know, I guess I'll have to wont I?"

"Well you don't have to but it would help. Well if you looked over here, what do you see?" we moved forward a few paces then he made me look at the white space on the wall I just noticed earlier.

"The wall is white where the rest is red? I don't get what I'm supposed to be seeing." I was staring at a white wall! What was there to see?

"Look harder. Focus on what is behind the wall."

I stood there for a good minute or so staring at the wall trying to visualize a set of stairs. I would have thought that Mr. Que had gone insane if a pair of red and black stairs hadn't appeared out of nowhere.

"You see?" I heard a voice say then I noticed that Mr. Que had walked through the wall and onto the first step.

I lost focus when I noticed him standing on the stairs and now all I saw was that same white wall again.

"Just believe there are stairs and walk through the wall."

"Walk through the wall? Are you mad!" if any normal person saw this they would have thought I was mad because of that I am talking to a wall, but the fact was that I had been speaking to Mr. Que who was standing on the other side of the wall.

"I did, so can you." he had a point, if he could walk through the wall then so could I.

"Ok." I closed my eyes and took a step forward, and then another, and another, and without realizing it I was walking very slowly.

"You can stop and open your eyes now." and so I did. I turned around to see the white wall, now black on this side, stood behind me.

"Welcome to the real part of the school."

As we began moving around upstairs I noticed there were far more classrooms up here then downstairs. Red lockers still lined the walls, which made me wonder how many kids (and/or adults) came here.

"This is our academic portion of the school, the classes where you get to learn what a werewolf is, how vampires live while being dead, why mutants have the power they have. This is where you will learn everything you need to know with some survival tips included." he lead me down the hall past about seven doors with every kind of name from geometry and biology to bloodlust and power control.

"And this is where your first class will take place," he stopped me in front of a door that read "History behind the myth".

"History class?"

"Yes, you will learn a far bit more about yourself and what lies within you then you would read every single human book ever written about your kind."

"But I thought you said I was going to get a grand tour?"

"You did, well you saw the office and medical section of the school and now your in the academic section. There's really not much else _to_ see," he then placed his hand on my shoulder. "Don't worry, no one will bite you and if they do," he gave me a little wink, "You can claw their face."

"But…" I couldn't think of anything to say plus Mr. Que was already striding away so I doubt he would turn and listen to me.

"Looks like I'm going to have to face the rest of today alone." I gave a huge sigh and opened the wooden door to my first history class in this new world.

"So you're the new kid eh? I heard you were bigger," a few guys crowded around my desk at the back of the room a few minutes before class was over.

"Well sorry to disappoint you." even though I didn't have eyes in the back of my head I could sense that I was surrounded by these big buffoons.

"Think you're funny huh?" the biggest one and most likely the leader said taking hold of my shirt below my shoulders. Since he had short brown hair I could see the full contorted look on his face, along with his yellow slits of eyes.

"Well if believe I am funny then yes, maybe I am." he tightened his grip and pulled me out of the desk. Funny thing was that no one else around us seemed to car in the slightest that a big circle had formed around some big buffoon and the new kid.

"You're lucky it's just your first day, I'll let you off with a warning now but later, if you make any kind of smartass remark to me or any of my crew I'll smash your face in." then he threw me to the floor just as a bell rang signaling the end of history.

"Dicks…" I muttered so quietly I thought no one had heard me, but apparently I was wrong.

"What did you call me!" the big guy came back to pick me off the floor and carry me out the door where he threw me against the lockers. "I said I was giving a warning you little prick! Most kids don't ever talk back, but I guess you just want to get your ass kicked on the first day!" and before I could even cower over in pain he slammed a right fist straight into my stomach, knocking the wind out of me.

I began to cough up a little blood. He slammed a left into my side, a right into my heart. I didn't know what was happening inside me but my blood began to rush so fast I felt burning hot. My muscles contracted and grew, my senses heightened to where I could hear the heartbeat of every person in this existing hallway, my head cleared of all thought, my stomach began to feel no pain. I could feel my finger nails growing, so when the big guy moved back to see the work he'd done on me I lashed out at his face, slicing the right of face.

Blood poured from his cheek, the smell aroused my senses, my lust for blood. I pounced on him lashing out even more, along with putting a few punches in his face. By this time a group has formed around us yelling "fight, fight" and screaming some random things like " kick his ass!" I didn't take any notice of them because all I wanted to do was tear his face off and drink his blood. To sink my teeth into his neck seemed like a godsend, but to actually do it seemed like a sin.

"Help me you idiots!" I heard him yelled under all the blood gushing from his face. His friends moved in on me. I turned and roared at them, or to me it seemed like a really loud growl, and they all backed off.

_Take his blood Jason. Kill him for what he did to you, unfair treatment will not be tolerated. _That voice sounded in my head again making what was only thirty seconds seem like thirty days.

"Blood…I want your blood…" I whispered in his hear before I sunk my teeth into his throat and drank the thick, rich, and very powerful crimson liquid pouring into my mouth. I felt bulletproof, indestructible, and immortal.

"What is going on here!" a familiar voice rang in my ears making me release my grip on the guy who I just drained and sat back against the lockers breathing hard.

"It was him! The new kid, he did this! Help Drake!" one his friends yelled at the man walking towards us.

"Good lord! I come to check up on you and help you to your next class but I come and see you've drained this young man of his life. Come with me." he hurriedly said grabbing my arm and pulled me to my feet and dragging me over the bloody mess I had created.

"Why did you do it?" he asked me once we were safe with his office door closed.

"He pissed me off and I don't know…something took over and I just lashed out at him. Once I smelled his blood I couldn't resist sinking my teeth into him and-"

"Couldn't resist! What do you mean you couldn't resist! You're a bloody werewolf boy not a vampire! You should have cravings for meat, not blood." he yelled and sat down in a huff.

"I'm sorry…I don't know what came over me, I swear. And I promise you all I wanted to do was drink his blood; I felt no craving for _eating _him." I don't know what I felt, my mind was spinning and I couldn't get a grip on reality.

"Yes well, now I have a dead student on my hands, not to mention what this will do to the covenant…" he trailed off as if he said more then he should.

"The covenant, sir?"

"Yes the covenant! Half vampire, half werewolf, when they find out, if they haven't already, that a werewolf has been drained of all blood there may be some trust conflicts between the two. But I'm still intrigued to know why you preferred to drink his blood instead of tear his throat out." he placed his hands under his chin as if to show me that he was in deep thought about the situation.

I looked up at him hoping for him to see a the sympathy on my face, "I don't know-"

"My lord!" he interrupted me, "Your eyes my boy! Their blood red. This is very interesting." he got up and moved out of his office door, shutting it slowly behind him.

What the hell had happened upstairs? I understand what he said by werewolves preferring meat over blood, but for someone who actually experienced the event he seemed more bewildered then me.

"Jason," his voice sounded again opening the door. "This is Professor White."

The women following close behind Mr. Que was tall and slender with skin as white as the marble floor in the halls with flowing and black hair that wrapped around her shoulders. Her eyes were the color of deep emeralds, no slits, which meant she had to be a vampire. She wore a sparkling black dress that hugged her body like another layer of skin and split at the legs like jeans ( I guessed for more freedom to fight).

"Hello Jason," her voice was dreamy like an angels. "You may call me Ms. White if you prefer. Now I hear that you drank a fellow students blood instead of tearing his throat apart like a normal wolf?"

"Yes." my mind couldn't process anything else to say, I gawked at how beautiful someone who was dead could possible look.

"That, along with your eyes being deep crimson is rather interesting. Do you have any vampires in the family or have you ever been bitten?" she moved to sit on the edge of the desk with such grace it seemed she had danced to the desk.

"No, I don't think so. No one in my family is or ever was for all I know, anything. I'm scared to tell my parents that something's wrong with me let alone tell them what I'm becoming."

"Well maybe you should ask your parents why they specifically choose Toronto to move to and or why they moved. I'm sure you'll be surprised at what you'll learn tonight," she then turned to Mr. Que. "We will need to clean this up and make a cover story to tell the covenant before they find out, if they haven't already." then she left the room the same way as she moved to sit on the desk leaving Mr. Que and I staring at each other.

"Well maybe there is more to your family then you may know. I'd take her advice and find out something about your family history tonight. As for the rest of the day, you will need to spend in my office like any other student who just killed another." he laughed at what he just said, "I'm not mad at you anymore Jason, you seem to be the kind that have secrets worth digging up." and with that he left his office leaving me completely dumfounded and with nothing to do but stare out the window.


	5. Chapter 5

CHAPTER 5

"How could you guys not have told me about this school!" I yelled furiously.

"Shut up will you! You can't be yelling in a small car with it's windows up." James replied poking at his ear.

"The reason we didn't tell you anything is because we thought your parents told you why you were here…" Katie trialed off.

"Apparently I didn't know anything! God and I killed a kid. That can't look good for anything." I looked down at my lap wondering what will happen to me.

"Yeah, I heard you drank Drake, so called the boss of the school, and the football team's captain. No one's ever stood up to him before so that's why he picks on anyone he wants." Mike said leaning forward to give me thumbs up.

"Well hey; this is all in the past now ok? Look, I talked to the coach and he wants to see you play in the scrimmage with us Friday. At first he was quite determined to stomp a no into our heads but after everyone who played the other day told him how good you were he couldn't refuse." James said leaning his head back so I could better hear him, even though I could hear him fine without the effort.

"That's cool, I guess. Ok I have a question, if this school is for werewolves, vampires, and mutants, how come I can't see your eyes differ from each other?" I asked noticing earlier this morning that none of their eyes had slits or anything abnormal.

"Contacts," Mike said poking his eye. "See the school gives every guy contacts to hide their eyes from humans so they don't get scared and come to our front door with shotguns and such."

He looked at me without his contact in and sure enough his eyes were slit. The story made sense too, but if the school gives them contacts why didn't I get any? I know I killed someone and all but surely Mr. Que would have mentioned it to me, or maybe that's something I was suppose to learn in class…

"So then us three are werewolves and Katie and Carly are vampires?"

"Carly is, I'm a werewolf."

"Man, today has been really confusing for me. How much more of this am I going to have to endure?"

"Jason, this is who you are. There's no escaping this life or world anymore, you're stuck with us. Look, don't worry about it ok? You'll learn more when we all hang out at the abandoned house Thursday." Katie said gripping my arm.

"Thursday? What about the until then?"

"You'll most likely be under house arrest after today for a week or two." Mike said starting to laugh. "And don't try to leave your house or you'll have a few covenant members on your ass in seconds."

"What? Wow, now I feel better." my mind was spinning now, all this was to much to take in for one kid in one day.

"Look, just go home and talk to your parents. Ask them about your family history and just chill until it's Thursday, I'll even come and see you everyday with work and the latest gossip."

"Wait, I thought you said I was going to be on house arrest? How am I going to get to wherever we're going Thursday?"

James pulled up in front of my house and turned around, "Don't worry about that, we'll sneak you out right under their noses." and then I was shoved out of the car and left staring at my beige empty looking house.

I opened the front door and tiptoed through the threshold as quiet as a mouse not to disturb anyone who might be doing anything that needed silence, or privacy. I turned the knob and shut the front door and quietly as possible, catching the winds finally attempt at pushing into the house.

There was the presence of evil in the house, I could smell it, and it made every hair on my body stand up. The farther I tiptoed down the hall looking to me right; the beige leather couches had been set up along with standing black lamps and a few pictures were hoisted on the walls. There were no lights on anywhere from what I could see from where I stood, but there was the faint sound of whispers. I followed the whispers, not knowing they'd lead me straight into the pitch black of the basement. Everything felt wrong about this: hearing someone whispering down there furiously, me following them and into the darkness not knowing what lies ahead.

"What do you mean he's a werewolf? He can't be, he's one of us, or should have been if you hadn't moved." I couldn't tell what kind of voice this belonged to because it was so faint and distant.

Thankfully the basement door had been kept open, so I kneeled down and listened as hard as I could with my new found hearing ability. "I don't know how he became one of them, maybe someone in the family who was once a werewolf passed it down a certain number of generations or something." that whispering voice I could tell as my dad, and he sounded frightened and cornered.

"Well I don't know what to do, they sent us over here to find out what happened to you guys and what are we going to tell them now? `Sorry but the kid is a werewolf for some reason, and you know if we were to turn him he'd die' how the hell will the rest of them take such news?" someone sent him or her and there were more of them, and what was it saying about going back to the rest of them?

"Dave look, I don't know what to tell you, or them for this matter too. All I know is my kid is a werewolf, God knows how he is but we can't change that now. And if you even think about…hey look at me!"

"He's here, I can smell dog in the air."

The next few seconds, or minutes it seemed like, happened way to fast to comprehend. I heard a shout and a bone across flesh strike, a body hitting the floor hard and the next thing I knew I was standing face to shoulder with a tall pale skinned man with a wide grin on his face, showing off his canine teeth.

"I should have guessed you were a vampire the way you talked about me being a werewolf. Who are-"

I was cut short by the most ear splitting screech I'd ever heard, anything that came close to this would be that screeching sound you get when cutting meat and the knife meets the plate or scraping nails across a chalkboard.

When the horrible screeching ended the man named Dave spoke again, "You filthy little dog! How dare you betray your family and join ranks with _them_!"

"What are you talking about? I didn't join ranks with anyone, I just started school today."

"Don't lie to me boy, I can tear your throat out with my bare nails! Who bit you?" he slashed me across the face similar to the way I hit Drake earlier that day.

"No one bit me, and don't hit me like that again. I've already killed captain of the football team on my first day here, you don't want to test me."

"I can smell his blood in your system, I know what you did already. But don't think you are any kind of match for me, I have been around for centuries. I know things you won't learn in text books, I can do things you wouldn't dare think or see in any of your little human horror movies," he grabbed a handful of my shirt and threw me against the wall and before I even had a chance to coil over he was on me again, his chest as hard as cold concrete. "Now tell me boy, who bit you!"

"No one bit me, for Gods sake I didn't even know why we moved here and I've just become aware of this whole werewolf thing myself! I know nothing of how or where it came from, please let me go." unfortunately for me, he didn't let go, he actually pressed down harder on me forcing air right out of me.

"You know you're luck I wasn't sent here to kill you, or not the way I intended to kill," and he pressed his free left hand into my stomach scaring ever last ounce of air I was hiding out of my lungs. "But I can sure as hell make you pay for what you did."

The pressure against my chest was unbearable, the pain in my stomach felt like a thousand tiny knives stabbing into my flesh, my empty lungs stung to high heaven. If I was a werewolf I would probably be dead in a few seconds, but I'm glad I am so I can withstand more then a human.

"You know you're starting to piss me off a little." I managed to say with that last little dust of air I had.

"Oh really? Well then I'd better crush you before you can do anything shouldn't I?"

I didn't even know how this was and he already pissed me off beyond my limit. Not just for immobilizing me against a wall of my own house but for striking my dad down, oh and for slashing my face.

I don't know how I do it but somehow when I'm mad, like I experienced earlier, every sense of mine heightens, my muscles grow, and I begin taking on a new shape.

After a few seconds of letting my blood pump faster and faster throughout my body I start changing.

"What are you doing? Stop it!" and he tried to suppress me against the wall harder.

"You've never pissed off a werewolf before have you?" and with that I lashed out both my arms breaking his hold on me and to stumble back to watch what happens next. Even I didn't know what would happen next, all I knew was that my body would be enlarged like my arms had when I lashed out at Drake earlier.

I fell to my hands and knees feeling my body change: my muscles cramped up on each other and stretched out. I felt hair growing all over my body at a rapid pace, a wave of pain surge through every fiber of my being forcing a blood curdling howl of a beast to emanate from my throat. During this howl I felt my face twist and stretch itself into a wolfs muzzle. My whole body was expanding like an inflating balloon making the clothes I wore rip to shreds and fall to the floor.

After this whole transformation I felt weird standing on all fours. I looked down and around, I had paws, a body covered in pitch black fur, a tail stuck straight up in the air, and a foul feeling to kill the person, or vampire, standing in front of me.

"Impressive I have to admit. I didn't know such a young boy who could fully transform," he turned to focus on something out in the backyard. "But unfortunately I am afraid I cannot stay any longer to play, I must get back to my hotel room before the full moon arises." and any normal human eye he would have been gone in a blink of an eye, but for me in my new found form I saw him dash to the door and stop. "Maybe next time I'll bring you a chew toy!"

I leapt after him, covering the whole hallway in one leap, but I was to late. I could see him racing down the street to the left as I stalked out into the front lawn.

"Jason! Oh my God, is that you?" someone yelled to my right and I jerked my massive head toward them.

It was Katie and James with three taller men in all black. They all twitched and stepped back in fear the second I turned on them.

"Holy shit man, you're MASSIVE! Man, I hope I'm that big when I transform." James said coming closer to me with such slowness I felt bad he was so cautious.

"James, stay back from him. He may still be dangerous." one of the men said to Katie's left, my right.

I looked him straight in the eye and he twitched at this contact, _"It's ok, I won't hurt my friends. _and he just nodded

Then to James who still inched closer and closer ever few seconds like a curious cat stalking it's mouse prey. _"It's ok James, I won't hurt you. Tell Katie she may come closer to." _

"Whoa, did you just speak in my mind? Hey Katie, he said it was ok to come closer."

Soon both of them were at my side rubbing their hands through my thick brown fur. The three tall men came closer too, but to ask if they could ask a few questions of why I summoned them. Mostly the questions consisted of who was in my house, if there had been anyone with him (which there is more with him but they weren't in the house at the time), what he did to force me to change.

From the time I changed to now, which I was still in wolf mode, I hadn't really had time to think about the change or how it affected me. I thought the change had been painful but very worth it after I saw the effects; I felt tons stronger, my senses were far better then any humans, I was faster, and I had scared off that vampire who tried to kill me and struck my dad.

"_Dad…"_ I thought, instantly I turned and ran through the front door, quickly followed by James, Katie and the three men.

I ran down the hall and flew down the stairs into pitch blackness, but thanks to the light of the newly rising sun I could see even in this level of darkness. I sniffed around for my dad, but all I could smell was blood. I followed the smell to what I thought was a cold damp corner of the basement with the body of my dad sprawled out on the floor lying in a wet pool.

I nuzzled his side with my new nose hoping he would wake up and roll over to a gigantic brown wolf pushing at him.

"_Dad, wake up!"_ I could feel hot wet tears start flowing from my eyes onto my muzzle. He wouldn't stir from either nuzzling him or calling into his mind. "_I need help down here!"_ I called out to the group upstairs.

Soon the three men came down and came to my side. One of them kneeled down and took my father in his arms and took him upstairs.

"Good lord!" Katie yelled as I came padding up the stairs.

"Your father has lost a considerable amount of blood. We could take him to hospital but by the time he's seen he may be dead, the only thing that could keep him alive is a bite." the one holding my father said looking me in eye with great sympathy.

"_What do you mean a bite?"_ I padded over to sit beside them.

"A vampires bite. He will go through a change, and a painful one at that, but he will survive and be up and moving again by tomorrow morning."

I took a few minutes to mull over if I should have my dad turned into a vampire or risk him dieing in a hospital bed. After I decided it was for the best to keep him alive, I nodded to the man holding him. "I shall take him to his bed and start the process." and he took my father upstairs, who I was not to see until the next morning.

_"So when will this change wear out?"_ I asked turning to one of the men who went to sit in the living room, the other man said he would stand watch at the front door.

"Whenever you want it to wear off, only you can reverse the change at anytime.

Katie and James came in from the kitchen and sat down on either side of me; James had a ham, turkey, and Swiss cheese sandwich, and Katie had a package of meat apparently for me to eat.

"_So who are you guys anyways?"_ I asked thankful that the effects on speech while having your mouth full doesn't have the same effect when your speaking through the mind.

"We are from the covenant, surely you must have guessed that."

_"I should have known. Well what happens now? After all that's happened today and yesterday." _

"Well for killing Drake Greene, you would be set on house arrest. But in these circumstances that you are vulnerable to another vampire attack we will let you room free."

_"Thank you. I'm going to in the kitchen and try to change back, in the mean time can one of you get me a towel or some shorts. I have a feeling I'm not going to be wearing anything when I'm human again." _I sent out my message to anyone who would listen.

When I padded into the kitchen I wondered how I could change myself back, and if it was as easy as just thinking it. I sat there focusing on becoming human again, and sure enough a few minutes later my body began to morph back. My bones shrinking in places and stretching in others, my muzzle shrank back into my human face making it feel like someone slammed a sledge hammer square between my eyes. My hide shrank back into a normal sized stomach, my body morphed in a way that my two front paws became arms and hands again, and my back straightened into a spine once more. All the fur receded to God knows where, my canine teeth shrunk back into my gums shooting an arrow of pain through my head.

I laid naked on the kitchen floor in a dirty mess of hair and blood. It took my senses a little while to calm down to a human standard, so while I lay on the wooden floor I could feel cold air coming from the basement through tiny cracks. I could hear the man upstairs striding to and down the stairs, as well as James or Katie fetching me a towel or a pair of shorts.

"Are you alright, Jason?" the man who sat in the living room came to check on me.

"Besides having your senses heightened to a werewolves standard while in a humans body, and a few bumps and bruises not to mention your entire body morphing to and from a giant wolf. I'm fine."

"Seems like you had fun," he winked at me. "You'll get used to it."

"Here's some shorts and a pair of boxers, oh my God!" Katie gasped, apparently she wasn't used to seeing her friends laying naked on their kitchen floor.

"Thanks," I grabbed for the shorts as she handed them down to me. "Um, can you guys turn around while I change?" and with a giggle or two they turned around while I changed.

"Much better," they all turned back around.

"Dude, you work out?" James exclaimed.

"No, why?"

"You're ripped! Look!" he pointed to my stomach.

My stomach was as flat as the kitchen countertop with little ruffles for abs. "Holy crap man, how, when did this happen?"

"Don't ask me man, but that's really awesome."

"It's your new body. You'll notice a few things different about your body since the transformation." the man said.

"Well your fathers done and like I said, he won't be able to do anything and will be in some pain until tomorrow morning." the man who "bit" my dad said coming to join the rest of us in the kitchen.

"So do you guys have names or any kind of classification?" I asked looking at both of them wondering if they had a name to differ them from each other.

"You need just know that we work for the covenant. I know we may all like similar, or close to it, but we do not give out names," he turn to the man on the right. "We should go now." and the other nodded without saying a word.

We followed them to the front door where he repeated that they were leaving to the one who kept watch.

"Wait, you said I could roam free right? Well am I still allowed to go to school?" I called after them as they were about half way to the street.

"That is for you to decide, not us." and just like the vampire, Dave, they were gone in a blink of an eye.

"So are you going to come to school tomorrow?" Katie asked, and the three of us went to sit in the living room.

"I don't know, maybe." a picture of my mum flashed through my mind. "Say where's my mum during all this?"

They both glanced at each other then looked at me.

"That's a good question," A voice came from the hall. "And what do you mean by `all of this'?" my mum had just walked in with a bag of groceries, we all got up to help her.

"I'll tell you later, or tomorrow. Right now, or tonight rather, don't sleep in your room," she had a confused look on her face as she handed me a bag. "I'll explain that later too."

The whole day seemed really bad, except for the first few minutes at school where I met Clary and learned about my new life. But from the time I had been picked on, killed Drake Greene, come home to find my dad being murdered by a vampire, me turning to a wolf, meeting some men from the covenant, my dad being bitten to turn into a vampire, me turning back to a teenage human, I didn't have much time to think about anything or why my mum didn't show anywhere around the house.

I guess this is the beginning to my new life as a teenage werewolf.


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 6

"So you're a werewolf? That's something I would never have guessed." my mum told me while we sorted out the groceries.

I had told her everything that happened during the day; from going to school to scaring off the vampire. She knew I killed Drake, she now knew about the vampire speaking with dad in the basement, the little confrontation between us, my little questioning with members of the covenant, knew that one had turned dad to a vampire, and was surprised to learn that I was a werewolf.

"Why is surprising? Surely there is someone in the family with the werewolf gene or curse, whatever it is."

"Well maybe there had been a few," she let a big sigh as she lead me onto the couch in the living room: Katie and James had left after they helped us bring the groceries in. "Your father knows more about the family history then I do, but I will tell you what I know."

She went into a whole story it seemed like, telling how most of the family were vampires. Or the _whole_ family were vampires, with a few exceptions like me. Told me how we lived in Italy until I was born then ran to England in hope of escaping the family, and that is the same reason why we moved over here. She didn't know exactly why we moved away from the family, I'll have to ask dad tomorrow sometime.

"Your father never told me why we left, only saying their vampires and wanted to harm us. We were cornered once in Italy and that's what sparked us to move."

"But you don't know the real reason why?" I believed and trusted my mum but after having that vampire in the house I didn't want to leave anything out.

"No, I told you I didn't. See that's why I said I was confused when you told me you were a werewolf. Your eyes don't show it, so both your father and I thought you were either a vampire to be awakened or you were," she paused for a second as if what she was going to say might hurt her. "Just, normal."

"I got that at school too, but why would that be?"

"I don't know. Well I think it's best you go get washed up and come eat, then head to bed." she got up and headed into the kitchen to prepare dinner.

I stared out the clear window in the living room seeing the full moon spray the landscape with flashes of yellow mixed with the darkness of night as it rose into the sky. It still confused me about why Dave, the evil vampire, wanted to leave before the full moon rose into the sky.

Finally, after a few minutes of wondering I got up and headed for the shower. A wave of relief and laughter washed over me as I came up the stairs to hear my dad snoring so loud I wouldn't even hear dynamite go off in the backyard.

"I'm glad you're still alive and snoring like an elephant." I laughed to myself as I shut the door into the bathroom.

Flicking the lights on I gasped and choked back my own screams as I blankly stared at the mirror.

_Blood will be sacrificed for what you have done__, _was written in oozing blood on my mirror. Out of instinct I smelled it. It smelled familiar but I couldn't remember where I've scented it before.

I moved to the tub out fear of what might be in the tub. I pushed the curtains aside and this time I did scream. Drake Greene's body lie in a dirty bloody pool in my tub.

"Oh my God! Mum get up here!"

I fell to the ground in shock and fear. I couldn't think straight, with everything that has already happened someone has to dump Drakes body in my tub.

"Did you call me?" my mum asked opening the door. "Oh my lord…." was all she could say after I pointed to the tub. "Let's get the body out of here and clean up."

I lay there while my mum went to gather up a garbage bag and some things to clean away the blood. She came back with her cooking apron on, a plastic mask, plastic gloves, and black boots. She held two garbage bags in her right hand and cleaning products in a bucket in her left. She looked like a hotel cleaning lady who's going to clean up a murder.

"Help me get the body in the bag then I can handle the rest." she set down the bucket of supplies and set to opening one of the bags.

It didn't take long to get Drake into the bag since I had twice the strength of a human. I just picked up his disgustingly bloody limp body and dumped him into the bag like he weighed no more then a case of water. I stood up and felt cold liquid run down my arms and chest making me shake with utter disgust to have someone else's blood on me.

"I will take care of the rest, the bathroom will be clean within the hour ok?" she looked back at me from pulling the second bag over the first. "Can you take this and put it in the garage? And take a towel to wipe yourself off."

I pulled out a white towel from under the sink, slung it over my shoulder and picked up the garbage bags. I felt Drakes body inside the bag and I began to shake violently as I made my way down the stairs, around the corner to dump it into the garage.

"Well I hope things don't get any worse then this," I said backtracking up the stairs to my room.

I had no idea how much worse things could get.

I shut my door and started wiping myself down, blood running off onto my wooden floor. A rush of cool air came pulsing through my room chilling my skin making my hair stand up.

"Well I didn't think we would find you so fast," a deep dreamy voice sounded to my left.

My neck popped from moving it so fast to see who said that. "Who are you? What are you doing in my room?"

The man crouching just outside my window wore a robe as black the night that surrounded him like a shadow protecting its owner. His face pale as the full moon above and his eyes black as night. As I studied him I could have sworn I noticed a drop of blood fall from his lips.

"Technically I'm not in your room, but if you wish it all you have to do is invite me in. I promise I won't harm you and it would be more comfortable for me," he said pointing a pale white hand toward my bed. "and by the way my name is Richard, Richard Castore."

My mind went instantly blank. His name Castore too? But how? I just learned of having a huge family in Italy that we ran from but why would someone be here, if he really is part of the family.

"Don't worry, I'm not going to hurt you or even try to argue with you over anything." he took a breath and moved closer to the window. "I'm not like Dave, and I sincerely apologize for his behavior and for what he did to your father, and my dearly beloved brother." ok now I was freaked. I had a vampire squatting outside my window who claimed to be my dad's brother which meant…he was my uncle.

"Wait, did you just say you're my dad's brother? So that means you're claiming to be my-"

"Your uncle, that's right." he finished my sentence for me.

I didn't know what say. My mind was blanker then a piece of computer paper and I had someone who I've never met before saying he's my uncle yet I couldn't think of anything to say to him.

We both stood staring at each other for a few minutes in pure deafening silence. I could feel my heart starting to pound so hard I thought Richard might be able to hear it.

"Can I come in?" he asked again. His voice was so soothing.

"If I do you promise not to hurt me or break anything in my room?" I asked reaching for my chair sitting at my computer desk to my left.

"Jason, you have no reason to fear me. I am one of the better, more controlled vampires of the family. Although the smell of blood on your floor is very invigorating."

Did he smell the blood that I wiped off myself?

"Ok, you may come in. I warn you though, if you even think about touching anything I'll go wolf on you." I said as he slipped into my room and sat on my bed soundlessly.

"I would not want to have such confrontations, especially not with such a young wolf that has yet to discover his true potential. I would so unwise to stay and try to fend you off." was he actually saying I could kill him, a vampire who has powers and most likely years of experience beyond my belief?

"So you would run?"

"Of course, you cannot expect a full grown vampire to try and fight a new born wolf in such a small surrounding. Once your instincts took over you would tear my to shreds in seconds."

Maybe that's why Dave ran earlier.

"So are we going to talk about how I can kill you in wolf form all night or is there a reason you came here?" I swiveled around in my chair to lean against the back part.

"Yes there is a reason I came here but now that I found out about you being wolf, my visit here has been a failure." he took a breath and lied back on my bed, legs hanging off the end.

"I came to fulfill the family tradition, to awaken the vampire within you."

"What do you mean, awaken the vampire within me?"

"Maybe if you would let me continue and end the whole story I wish to tell you maybe you would learn something or two about yourself, instead of interrupting every two seconds," he sighed and waited to see if I would say anything. After a few seconds he continued as before.

"As I was saying, I came to perform the tradition of awakening the vampire inside you. Our family has a tradition of turning a family member within the ages of 16 to 25, if we do it any sooner or later there's a chance the body will reject the change and you can die. Now my brother was turned when he turned 17 and he loved everything about the change, but by the time he turned nineteen he began to hate what he had become. He ran from the family to northern Italy where he met his wife, Jennifer, and went to college. They started dating within days of meeting and dated all the way through college then got married the year of graduation then had you two years later. I'd heard that someone found where my brother was hiding-"

"Can you call dad by his name instead of saying my brother all the time?" I interrupted.

"Sure. Well like I said someone found where Ben ran off to and once that information was let loose Dave had been ordered to go and either bring him back or kill him on the spot. And of course being the loving brother I am, hearing all that I ran to find Ben myself, to warn him of what was coming. Luckily I found him a few days later just sitting in a bus stop shelter waiting for the bus. I didn't seem to notice me even as I sat next to him but once I told him he was in danger he instantly knew. We had the usual family reunion of hugging and asking how each other was doing, but it didn't last long as I had to tell him to leave before Dave found him. As we sat down on the bus I broke the news to him and he seemed awe struck. He began to struggle for words as I could tell fear had struck hard. 'We have to leave, we have to leave tonight' he said to me. As to who the 'we' were I did not know because I did not yet know of Jennifer or your existence. After leaving the bus and walking a few blocks surrounded by houses the looked to belong to lawyers and doctors alone we came to a two story white brick house. The house was as beautiful outside as it was inside. Flowers crowded the walkway, an oak tree rooting high into the sky in the middle of the front lawn, a paved rock driveway leading to a two car garage. The front door painted dark red with a black cross near the bottom.

"I stepped onto hard wood floor inside the front door to an aroma spaghetti. Jennifer called out to Ben and he answered back followed by saying he had a guest with him. I had not the faintest idea Ben had a girlfriend at the time let alone a wife. But as we walked into the dining room there you two were, Jennifer, a beautiful blonde woman with green eyes and long eyelashes plopping spaghetti onto little Jason's plate. You were so small and fragile looking with hair as black as the night, I instantly knew you were different from other children.

"I was shocked beyond belief at what Ben had come to have in his life, a well paying job from the looks of the beautiful house and a beautiful wife and child.

"After dinner had finished Ben took to telling Jennifer the news about someone coming to find them and how they needed to get away. I heard the whole thing, being a vampire and all I could hear through walls. Well she kept asking why he couldn't just shoot the man coming to get at them and well it's not really a good idea to tell your wife that a savage vampire is coming to kill your family and maybe rape then turn you wife. They argued well into the night and after proposals of no sex for a month he finally gave in and told her. She didn't take it to well of course and start shouting louder. I took it as my responsibility to take you out of the house for a little bit and let things cool down. Now being born a vampire I spoke and told Ben I was taking you out for a walk through telepathy, and he replied with an ok. I felt a little surprised by how he could speak through his mind after all these years.

"We walked around the block for about an hour talking about several things from school to life itself. Now being born to a vampire father and human mother I wondered if you had the power to speak through your mind. I began by asking if you could hear me, you replied yes. After that we sat against the garage doors speaking through our minds while the wind blew through our hair. You were about seven at the time I believe, I could be wrong.

"Well once your parents had calmed down I asked if it was ok to come in and with minutes of waiting for a reply I took it that both were asleep. I took you in and tucked you into bed, then set out to feed for the night. I wondered if your father ever fed or if he had become more human since he left.

"The next morning when I awoke on the couch I heard nothing but ringing in my ears. No footsteps, voices, coffee brewing, nothing. I started to look around and noticed that clothes were taking, closets emptied, fridge and freezer emptied, something from everywhere seemed to be taken. Both cars were gone, and a letter was left on the kitchen table as I decided to make some breakfast. It said that they packed up and left early this morning to go to England. He did not say where in England, so it would take a fair amount of time to find you all again.

"Dave showed up just as I made a sandwich for lunch and threw me against the wall threatening to tear my throat out if I didn't tell him where Ben had gone. Of course I didn't tell him anything and he was much to angry to read my thoughts correctly, so I had not worry about that. Dave took to tearing the house apart as I sat eating a grilled ham and cheese sandwich and drinking a can of Dr. Pepper. After completely tearing every bedroom apart to the point of knocking through walls and pulling up the carpet he stormed out of the house and back to the family manor to break the news that Ben had escaped the clutches of death and how I might have had a role in saving him.

_any questions so far?_ his voice asked within my head

"Huh, what? Oh, yeah. Why did they want dad to be killed?"

"Because he ran from what he had become instead of learning to master the full potential of what he _could_ become and betraying the family."

"How did he betray the family?"

"He fell in love and had offspring with a human, but only mother and father knew that and they dared not tell anyone else. So all Dave knew was that he ran away and dad wanted him back or dead.

"I think you know the rest about living in England most of your life and then moving here. Again you ran for the same reason but this time it was I who found you, and they beat the information out of me…" his voice trailed off and sounded saddened.

"No way was I going to let you get harmed so while in England I told your father to run again, because they sent me to England to find you all and before I was about to call it quits there was Ben in a drugstore. I went back to the manor and they instantly attacked me."

"So are you here to tell me that Dave tried to kill my dad again earlier and your going to tell me that we have to move again?"

"No, your father must be dead so his job is done and he will be heading back to the manor as this week has ended."

"And another thing, you said my dad was turned when he was seventeen right? Well then how come a guy from the covenant said he turned my dad into a vampire?"

"What?" he sat bolt upright. "Are you saying that my brother was human and a member of the Canadian covenant turned him _again_?"

"I guess, I don't know. What does it matter?"

"Your father was turned into a vampire when he was seventeen and once you're turned there's no going back, or until now we thought there wasn't. Ben must have found or made a cure for himself or something. This is very weird," he spoke so fast that I had a hard time keeping up.

"I still don't understand what the big deal is," I said trying to understand.

"Ok look, your father was a vampire at seventeen; he will forever be a vampire unless murdered. Dave killed your father earlier, and you say some other vampire turned him again? So that means he was a vampire, turned human again and was turned back. I think even you know from legends and myths that that is not possible. Yet somehow Ben pulled it off…"

Ok no I'm completely lost.

"I sense he is in the house, can I see him?" he asked getting to his feet.

"No, he's sleeping to let the change complete."

"My mind is spinning with theories, and you say you're a werewolf? That is very interesting, considering that your also half vampire."

"I'm half vampire?"

"Yes, because wolves have slit eyes if not wearing contacts and I can tell you are not, and I am still wondering why you can be werewolf too. It must be from your mothers side, I knew there was something different about her."

"Wait so what you're suggesting is that I'm a vampire and werewolf in one?" my mind was spinning now too at the thought.

"Yes. It's a million times rare that someone has been both breeds although there have been a few throughout history that have been both. But none in our bloodline."

"So I'm a special in this case?"

"Indeed you are," he got off the bed and literally floated to the window. "May I come back tomorrow some time to speak with Ben?" he asked putting his hand in the side of the window.

"Sure I guess. I don't know if he'll take lightly to you or not, so watch yourself whenever you come."

"Oh don't worry, I'm the brother he likes to see." with that he winked at me and pulled himself onto the roof outside the window and jumped into the night to return to wherever he came from.

That was really interesting and weird, learning about some family history that's not all to normal. Wondering how on Gods earth I could be both creatures of the night and not know anything about it. My dad for somehow coming up with a cure for vampirism or whatever he did.

"This life seems to keep getting more weird and cooler by the day," I said to myself climbing into bed and looking at my clock above the computer.

2:35Am.


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter 7

My dad burst into my room screaming the next morning which scared me awake.

"What happened to me! Who changed me again?" he sounded livid with whoever had changed him. "I swear if it's Dave I'm going to kill him!"

"Dad chill. It wasn't Dave, Dave actually _killed _you in the basement and left you die. You would have died too if I hadn't just come home."

"Dave was here? He killed me? What the hell is going on here?" he now sounded depressed and sat down in my computer chair staring out the window wanting answers only I could give him.

"Dad… some guy came to me last night saying he was your brother, Richard." his face lit up as he turned toward me.

"What? Richard was here last night talking to you? Oh Jesus, this can't be good." he sighed. "Did he tell you we had to leave again? What did he say?"

"He told me about the family tradition and that's why he came. Well actually, he came for me but before I even knew who he was I warned him not to make me mad or I'll go wolf on him. Then he realized I wasn't lying somehow and decided to tell me about why we left Italy to go to England and from there to here."

I rubbed my eyes and sat up figuring that dad wasn't going to leave me alone now. I got up and wobbled to my door. "Why don't we talk about this over some breakfast?" he got up and followed me downstairs into the kitchen.

I took to making some waffles while dad rambled on about how sorry he was about not telling me why we kept moving and promised me he had planned to tell me one of these days.

"I swear I kept telling myself I'd tell you about your past and family history before something like this happened again!" he seemed frantic and out of breath by the time he finished.

"It's ok dad, really. I know everything now so don't sweat it." I said pulling my waffles out of the toaster and raining them in syrup.

"Not everything…" he said and put his face in his hands.

"What you mean not everything?" I sat down across from him.

"I guess he told you they turned me when I was 17 right? And maybe you're also wondering if I was turned back then how was I turned again?"

"Yeah, both Richard and I were wondering that." I said taking a bite, warm syrup filled every little crevasse between my teeth as flavor exploded along my tongue.

"Well I guess I should tell you something myself," he sighed heavily like he didn't want to say anything. "I did find a cure to vampirism. I can't tell you how I did it though, because I know if I tell you and anyone besides Richard gets a hold you they might kill you or hurt you to get me to say how I did it, then will most likely kill both of us."

I know school had started already so there was no point in even thinking about going plus I had no way of getting there. Dad left for work about an hour ago and I've been standing under the hot water in the shower for about forty five minutes now. For all the things I've learned over the past few days and years I still had yet to know what my father did…

I stepped out rubbing my face and chest dry while looking over the bathroom. Mom did a good job cleaning up in here, no blood in the tub, on the floor, on the mirror, no residing smells, nothing. The bathroom looked as if nothing had happened over the past two days.

I turned on my computer and pulled some shorts out of my closet, then took to looking up things about vampires and werewolves. Most of everything I read is usually what you would already know or learned through common sense: vampires hate sunlight (duh), werewolves are brutally hurt or can be killed by almost anything silver and vampires can be slowed down from silver as well (I didn't know it could slow down vampires?).

"Well you do learn something new every day, or every other day." I said to myself scrolling down yet another page of 'facts within the vampire legends', stupid title for a website but it serves its purpose.

With about two and a half hours in total of searching about things I only learned about two new things from about thirty or so websites. One, vampires are slowed by silver bullets (mainly). Two, that there are two types of vampires: Lamia, which are the born vampires and made vampires.

"Done searching for something to kill yourself with?" a choked laugh sounded from behind me forcing my muscles to spin my chair involuntarily.

"What? Why would I want to kill myself, I like what I've become. Or what I think I am?" I said looking into the chalky white face of Richard.

"Well what did you find? Anything that you didn't know already?" he asked sitting on my bed even though sunlight poured on him like a blanket of light.

"Not really. I didn't know silver bullets could slow down vampires though." he nodded to my new discovery. "And I have a question."

"As long as I am around I will be your personal teacher on these matters, shoot."

"All the old and new legends say that sunlight can kill vampires, but if that is true then how can you be sitting there with sunlight pouring on you and not be burning up and turning into black ash?"

"Ah, very good question. Well it's simple, Lamia are immune to the deadly power of sunlight. It only weakens our power that's all. You do know what Lamia are I presume?" I nodded and he continued. "Only made vampires can be killed by direct sunlight, and even then they have to be exposed to the light for a set period of time."

"Oh…" was all I could come out with and it made me feel incredibly stupid.

"So I take that you are not going to school today, am I right?" he asked getting up off the bed and moving to lean against the inside part of the threshold to my room.

"No I don't think I can just show up after what's happened. I don't know how other kids of friends of Drakes will take it, so I think I'll give it another day or two I'm not sure yet." I swiveled around in my chair as I thought about when I would go back to school. I completely forgot about Richards's presence in my room.

"…walk?" I heard someone say bringing me back to reality.

"What?"

"I asked if you would like to go for a walk, or possible a run for some exercise?" he asked winking at me.

"Sure, I haven't exactly changed into a wolf by just _wanting _to. I've shifted through anger but not just to shift." I now too was on my feet looking at my closet. "Plus the last time I did my clothes ripped right off my body…" I said feeling my face heat.

"Ok so here's the plan. How about I take a bag with some extra clothes in for when you want to change back and we go to a mall downtown Toronto and find you some stretchy clothes and other things you may want to own. Would like your favorite Uncle Richard to buy you things for the first time?" he coughed out a laugh.

"You're my only uncle, So far." I nodded to his plan for our first day out together as family.

I really hadn't thought about how he would get here and back to wherever he was staying because I just kind of figured he'd run. But today he had a black Ford Expedition with darkly tinted windows sitting in the driveway. "I figured it would be kind of suspicious for a man and a giant wolf running side by side around town." he laughed getting into the driver's side.

The ride into Toronto was fairly quiet besides the SUV fighting against a strong wind south on the highway. The speed limit seemed to not apply to most drivers here, seeing as most go about twenty kilometers over the limit. How I would love to race a car in my wolf form along this highway.

We pulled into the two story parking lot connected to the side of one of the many malls in the Toronto city.

"So, where to first? Clothes? School supplies? Sports shops? Video game stores?" Richard asked while holding the door open for me.

"I don't know. Clothes I guess."

And so it was, we set out to find some clothing stores. Along the way I found a nice pair of runners and cleats for soccer, a chain with a dog tag attached, a silver ring with an emerald set into the top, and a pair of shades.

Walking past the food court I noticed a head of rustled brown hair that I could have sworn would belong to James. The closer we moved through the crowd of the food court I began to feel more certain it was James.

"James?" I called out to him, and he turned.

"Jason! What're you doing here? Thought you weren't allowed out of the house man?" he punched me on the shoulder making me flinch backwards. If he'd punched a human like that he would probably break his shoulder.

"You know I'm allowed out because of some vampire who tried to kill me. What are you doing here?" Richard gripped my shoulder tightly and moved closer as if to protect me from something.

"Oh right, right. What am I doing here? _We_ are taking our usual team day out, and speaking of vampire who's this?" at the sound of his words Richard clamped down on my shoulder now in attempt to hold his ground. Apparently vampires and werewolves still didn't like each other.

"This is my uncle Richard, who by the way is squeezing the shit out of my shoulder!" I ducked out of his grip and heard his fingers smack against the palm of his hand. "It's ok Richard, he's my friend." I turned back to James. "So a team out day and I wasn't invited? Huh?"

"Well as I said before, I thought you weren't allowed out of the house. So hey, since you're here why don't we all get together?"

"Sure, where are the rest of the guys?"

"They're over there," he pointed to a table of guys waving at us. "Yeah, that's them." we both laughed.

As we turned away from James and began our quest through the crowd to the table of arguing soccer players I looked up at Richard. "Hey why were you gripping my shoulder so hard? I thought vampires nowadays were cool with werewolves?"

"It's not that, we are. It's just, he has the same smell as the leader of the pack who attacked my family, killing my mate and some of the other members of our family…"

"Oh, I didn't know. Well look, I don't think James knows anything about that and if he does I know he wouldn't want to hurt you in any way. So hey, lets just have a good time with the guys and maybe later you could tell me more about this attack."

"Sure." and Richard took a seat behind me to watch over me but not make it so obvious.

The guys ate as if they were in wolf form. James alone had about five hamburgers with three large orders of fries and two large Dr. Peppers. The rest of the guys ate more or less then James.

"You guys sure have big appetites huh?"

"The hell we do! We're werewolves' man. I'm surprised you aren't eating anything or as much as we do." James commented, shoveling his fifth burger in his mouth.

"Yeah, I don't know. Maybe there's something different about me, who knows." I took a second to look around at the rest of them. All were shoveling burgers, fries, or some kind of sandwich in their mouths. People around us were gawking how much they were eating and some who were close enough to us to here James reveal our true nature moved away. "So what are we going to do today? I know you guys didn't skip school just for the hell of it."

"Of course we didn't. We came to shop, and stylize ourselves." Mike was the one to answer this time. He sat two chairs down, with two foot long sandwiches fully loaded from subway.

"What do you mean stylize yourselves?"

"Ourselves, you're part of this too you know. Besides this is the only chance we get to shop as a team anyways. You know the saying play as a team, dress and look like a team? Well that's what we're here to do."

"Yeah, besides shoes, we have to all look the same." Noah added taking a bite out of a triple cheese burger.

"And our hair, we can have different color streaks." Mike pointed out shaking his Coke around.

"Makes it easier for the crowd to pinpoint whoever their talking about if we're on the move." Tyler said stepping behind me to throw away his trash.

"But wouldn't the crowd already be able to tell who we are just because of how we look so different and have different color hair?" I asked feeling totally confused.

"Not when we're playing as werewolves." Brandon said.

"As werewolves?"

"Okay, seems you know nothing of what we do here so I'll explain a bit." James said shoveling the last of his fries into his mouth and taking a swig of his Dr. Pepper. "For us normal soccer against humans isn't enough excitement. A long time ago when different clans used to fight when they came in contact with each other, one clan came up with the idea of a sporting game in wolf form. Not many accepted the idea as most clans wanted to fight to the death to prove they were better and stronger. But over time as peace was beginning to befall our species we became accustomed to the game amongst each other."

"So not only do we play soccer against humans but we also play it against our own kind as wolves?"

"Exactly."

"I still don't see why we have to get streaks in our hair. What is the significance of that?"

"You're not very bright are you!" James laughed, then continued. "Look at all the guys. Some of us can morph and some, like me, can't yet, although we're still as strong as a full werewolf minus the four paws and snarling teeth." he took a second to think about what to say next. "So what I'm trying to say is that when we're on the field in wolf form the crowd can't recognize us. Like I said before, Mike for example can morph, so if you and him were running side by side or scored, no one would know who actually did it unless the other teammate is noble enough to say the other did score. If you have say a green streak along your hide and Mike has a red one, the crowd can cheer for you both, get it?"

"You repeated yourself some there, but yeah I get it." I laughed and he punched me in the shoulder.

"You ready to get your hair streaked Jason?" Tyler asked clamping both hands down on my and out of the corner of my eye I could see Richard tense up, ready to spring.

"Sure?"

With that everyone rose at once in unison, followed by myself and then Richard. The guys navigated through the mall, some knowing the gist of where we were going, otherwise we used Mike for his GPS of a nose.

"So hey, I noticed you have a load of shopping done? What you get?" James asked slowing down from the rest of the 'pack' to join me.

"Some clothes, shoes, shades, a ring," I flashed my hand out in front of me. "And this dog tag." I pulled the tag off my chest and flipped it around my fingers so James to see.

"Nice, and it actually has your name on it too! How awesome is that!" James said grabbing for the tag.

"Thanks. So I am I going to learn how to play soccer as a werewolf?"

"Yep, we'll play a scrimmage tomorrow so you'll know how it all works before Fridays game."

"Sounds good."

We all stopped in front of a fairly large hairstyling place filled with women getting haircuts, coloring and such. Different fumes radiated out from the place making our nostrils flare.

"The only thing I hate about this place is the smell." Tyler said covering his nose.

One by one we followed each other in where some asked for cuts and color and few just asked for color. James and I were the last to take a step forward to enter the place but Richard held me back.

"Richard, it's ok, we're all-"

"No, it's not them. I smell evil within this mall."

"What? Who? What are you going to do?"

"I'm going to go track them, my mind is telling me it's Dave, but I don't think he can make from here to Italy and back within three days, unless he really wanted to." he looked around and I could see his nose sniffing like a dog smelling for food. "I'll be back." and he was off in a blink of an eye.

"What was that about?" James asked when I took a seat next to him after putting my name down for a coloring.

"Richard said he could smell someone bad in the mall."

"Does he think it's the guy who hurt your dad?"

"He doesn't know. Let's not talk about it until we know more about what's going on."

"Okay, sounds good. So what color are you getting in your hair?"

"Since I have black hair, I'm thinking dark forest green. What about you?"

"Fire red. Tyler's getting orange, Brandon's getting blonde, Mike's getting maroon, and Noah's getting blue."

"Looking good guys!" Katie said coming out from a jewelry store across the way. She had on a torn pair of blue jeans and a plain black shirt on.

"Where'd you come from, and aren't you suppose to be in school?" James asked.

We all just stood there outside between the two places making a sort of glob of students that are not in school, surely someone would wonder why.

There was no one with Katie and no sign of Richard anywhere.

"Aren't you all supposed to be in school too? Just because it's Wednesday and you don't have practice doesn't mean you can skip a whole day of school. But about me, well I woke up late so I decided to come down here for a little shopping. I tell you I work at an Italian restaurant now? Make good money for being a waitress and the tips are amazing."

"So you wake up late and instead of being the goody-two shoes that you are, you decide to skip and come to the mall? What if your parents were shopping or something and they saw you?" James shot back at her. Everyone else including myself just stood as those two went at it.

After a good five or so minute they finally cooled down and came to an agreement.

"So you all got color in your hair for the games?" she asked examining each of us.

"Yeah, for wolf form." Mike said.

"I know that you mutt, I'm just making conversation." Mike hung his head like he'd been rejected.

"Hey, Katie, have you seen a vampire anywhere around here?" I asked as no one else wanted to talk and it seemed weird just to stand there not saying anything.

"I can't be sure, he was a vampire but he smelled different and seemed like he was tracking someone. Hope he got whoever he was looking for."

I looked over at James with a nervous look and turned back to Katie. "Where did you see him?"

"Why? What's going on, you sound like something's about to happen." she now looked nervous.

"Nothing, well I don't know. He's my uncle and before we went in to get color in our hair he went off saying he could smell someone evil in the mall. I have no idea who or what could be here but I want to find Richard, make sure he's ok."

"Oh. Well, before I came down here I saw him upstairs walking into the gun store."

"Why do they sell guns here? Couldn't someone just take them and kill people?" I felt really nervous now knowing someone bad could be in the gun store.

"No, they don't allow guns in the mall. You select the one you want then they ship it to you within the week, or that's how my dad told me they're distributed."

"Even if they don't allow you to take them, who knows what could happen if a vampire or werewolf gets their hands on one. No one would be able to stop them." I thought about Dave coming out with shotguns pointing at Richards's chest. "I think we should get up there fast."

"Just as a precaution?" James asked.

"Yeah, let's go."

Before we even started to move loud cracks began to sound and vibrate through the entire mall. People started running in panic shoving, tripping, and hurting themselves trying to get away and out of the mall.

"Looks like we better move faster." Brandon commented sarcastically.

The whole mall was a mess. People were making dog piles everywhere there was an exit. Escalators, stairs, and elevators were either empty or full of people trying to get down from upstairs. I couldn't even begin to imagine what the scene outside the gun store looked like.

We followed Mike again, up an escalator that was meant for people coming down. As we came to the second floor I noticed there were no people up here, yet screams still eradicated from everywhere. We ran to the right and down a hall to the left behind some stores.

Thirty second later we stopped dead at a back entrance to the gun store.

"Okay here's the plan." Brandon said getting out attention. "Jason, Noah, James and Katie, you all go to the front and split yourselves up so two people go in on one side two go in on the other. Once you're in position I will wave and then we go on and try to flush whoever, if someone is even in there, out. Got it?" we all nodded in approval. "Good, now go before someone runs off."

"I take it Brandon's the smart one of this group?" I asked while we ran quietly around to the front of the gun store.

"Brandon, Mike, and I are the smart ones. Tyler can be when he wants to be but it's mostly us three. You, Tyler, and Noah are the stronger ones, not saying the rest of us can't hold our own, but you know."

"Yeah."

We got to the front of the store and split into two groups: James and Katie stayed on the side we got to first and Noah and I went to the other side, then waited for Brandon to wave us in.

My heat started racing with excitement and adrenaline. I hoped this guy was in here somewhere so I could tear him apart.

"Jason, come on! Brandon's going on, James and Katie already went in." Noah said pulling on my sleeve.

We tiptoed through the place which seemed bigger then someone would think. Counters in the front left and back right corners, guns almost hiding the brown of the walls, a few deer and other animal heads were planted near the ceiling, and racks of clothes and protective clothing filled the middle of the store.

I could hear someone heaving in a rack near me. I opened the coat rack to a white man with brown hair and eyes look a hound holding a shotgun pointed right at my chest. "You best leave 'less you want a hole in your chest." the man had a country accent.

"I mean no harm. Where is the person who was up here shooting?"

"He ran off. Now leave me be." he pulled the coats closed again.

"Hey, guys!" everyone stood up to full height and looked around at me. "The man in the coat rack here said the guy who shot ran off into the mall."

"Let's go then!" Mike yelled.

"Wait, human or wolf?"

"Since no one's up here lets be on the safe side." Brandon said and morphed into a big chocolate brown wolf with a large blonde streak down the side of him.

"Let's have some fun guys!" Tyler yelled and morphed into a bright blonde wolf that looked like an enormous version of a golden retriever with an orange steak.

"Is it me or am I the only one who hasn't been able to morph yet!" James said out loud in a sad voice.

"Nope. I have yet to change." Noah said standing by James.

"Well you three can follow us on two legs. Come on Jason lets go find this guy." Mike said laughing and morphed into a big black wolf with a blood red maroon streak.

He seemed to be waiting for me to morph.

"Go, you won't do any good standing here feeling bad for us." James said waving me away. I morphed in my own wolf with a dark forest green streak.

_Okay, those three can catch up to us eventually. Right now we have to find this guy. _Brandon's voice sounded inside my head along with everyone else.

The four of us took off into the mall where Brandon stopped dead before the stairs. _How about this, since there is for of us, Jason, you and Mike go the other way and check the top floor and Tyler and I will check the ground floor and if we find anything call out to the rest of us and we'll be there in seconds. _Brandon said then took off flying down the stairs followed by Tyler.

_ Let's do this_. Mike said and took off to the right, I went left.

What would take me about five or ten minutes to cover as a human took only a few seconds to cover. After going around and passing Mike once we decided to chill and check out every store before we knew for sure no one was up here. Smelling wasn't working well, even for Mike. Not even Brandon or Tyler could find anything downstairs.

Pawing through a sports store, moving things and knocking things over a voice that didn't belong to one of my friends sounded in my head.

"Jason! Its Richard. I'm no longer in the mall and in pursue of the man who committed the shooting upstairs is driving along the highway toward your neighborhood. He smells like a wolf so I don't think he is one of the families, come as soon as you can."

My mind seemed warped. How could he get on the highway so fast from the time of the shooting?

_Hey guys! My uncle just told me the man is driving towards our neighborhood. He's not far on the highway so I think we could catch up if we stay in wolf form. _

_ Okay. All of you go ahead and I'll go inform James about this. _Brandon said.

_We aren't going to just leave you man! _Tyler said.

_Yes you will. Follow Jason, plus I was the one who drove you all here so I'm going to drive back alongside James. _Then we heard no more from Brandon, I guessed he changed back.

_Let's go guys, you heard Brandon. _I tried to have a commanding voice, but I don't think it worked for me.

_Alright. Let's get this bastard!_ Tyler said and Mike followed.

We ran through and out the mall and through the city, trying to stick to the shadows finding our way to the highway. Many people screamed and yelled bear as we ran past them but they didn't run when they noticed we weren't attacking them, but they kept screaming.

Run along the highway racing traffic and the other guys seemed like I was participating in a track meet. The air flew along my body making my hair flail all over like shadow that had trouble keeping up.

Minutes and cars passed by until we caught up to my uncles blue SUV following a little black car. Once I had them in sight I kicked myself into high gear and shot forward leaving the other two behind.

The little black car was pulling off the highway and with an exit there weren't many places to go in this area. I passed my uncle who waved and came up behind the black car, which tried to speed up.

I flew beside it and noticed I was about the size of the car. Looking into the driver's seat I saw a face I knew well, or thought I knew. I say thought because the face I saw in this car is the face of the football player I killed, Drake.

I slowed down and watched the car speed off down the side street.

My uncles SUV came to a slow purr next to me as I started to paw slowly down the street, my mind still trying to comprehend what I just saw.

"Why didn't you stop him? You were right there, right on him!" Richard yelled at me.

_What happened man? We saw you kick it and you were right next to the car, why didn't you stop him_? Mike asked coming to a slow walk beside me.

_It was Drake. _


	8. Chapter 8

Chapter 8

Later that night James, Katie, and I were sitting in the living room talking about how I could have seen Drake in that little black car while Richard made dinner. Mom or dad had not come home yet, which had me worried a bit, but no time to think about them when Drew is somehow alive and raising hell again.

Because James and Katie couldn't morph yet they couldn't fully believe that I saw Drew, but because Mike and Tyler had been there and in wolf form I showed them the whole scene and they know I wasn't lying. Then they both showed Brandon and he seemed to be convinced so James, Katie and Noah had to believe what I told them, despite how hard it is to believe.

"So it's been hours and we still haven't come up with some kind of conclusion to why he is still alive or somehow came back to life." Katie said rubbing her temples.

"Okay, I know this may seem pretty out there, but Jason, what if your dad has some kind of a role in this? I mean, no offence, but you don't know what he does, he doesn't come home until late, as you've told us that the whole family wants him dead or back with them for something, I don't know if we can completely trust him." James said with a sorry look.

"You think my dad would take me away from the family to put me in some kind of harm? He took me away to protect me, why would he have anything to do with Drake being alive once again?" I didn't really know what to feel. I wanted to be mad at James for saying such a thing but then again we don't have any kind of reason so we can't rule it out.

"I'm just saying man, don't hold it against me. Just think for a second though, he made a cure for vampirism what else do you think he's capable of?" James shrugged.

"Dinners ready!" Richard calls from the kitchen.

"Let's see what Richard thinks." Katie said walking into the kitchen first.

"Let's see what I know about what?" Richard asked setting a pot of spaghetti. He looked more like a mother then my uncle, wearing a blue apron and pulling off blue oven mittens.

"If you think my dad has any kind of role in how or why Drake is alive again."

"Well, I can't say. My opinion is that you can't yet rule that theory out. Now sit and eat." and we did just that.

As the sun started to loosen its grip on this side of the earth, Katie and James decided to head home before anything could happen. Luckily James had his mustang so they didn't have to walk, or run from whatever lurks around these streets at night.

Long after darkness had taken its rule over the western hemisphere my mom pulled into the garage. I came down the stairs in time to see her lugging plastic white grocery bags into the kitchen. Next thing I heard were things hitting the floor and breaking along with a piercing scream that could wake the dead.

"Why are you here? Get out of my house, now!" I heard mom yell after she could no longer muster up some kind of scream.

"Mom, it's ok. He's not here to hurt us." I said jumping over the stair railing and landing with a crack under my feet on the hardwood floor.

"Who is he? Why is he here? Where is your father?" she looked back and forth between the two of us.

"Jason, you've no need to explain for myself. But you may stay and fill in your mother once I am done." he said waving us into the living room. "Shall we?"

Richard sat in the recliner seat telling my mother, who was clinging to me on the sofa opposite him, about himself and why he was here. He told her everything from why he came here from Italy to protect and help us. She argued back with "why don't we just move again?" and he replied, "Well that would solve nothing now would it? It seems more logical, since Jason has matured and is able to a wolf much larger then I have ever seen, that we try to resolve the problem between them and us, or if it comes to it, we fight."

Hours passed by until my mom would let me get up and use the bathroom by myself without any worry that Richard would slaughter her in my absence. My dad still had not come home by eleven, which had all three of us worried.

"Well, I think it time you are off to bed Jason. Got an eventful day ahead tomorrow is that right? Practice game with the guys, a night out in an abandoned house and whatever else is happening." Richard said pulling me off the couch. My mom had already gone to bed ten minutes before.

"How do you know about the abandoned house thing? Even I forgot about that!" everything seemed to come back to me now. Katie and Mary asked if I would come to this house when we had our barbeque to meet the neighbors.

"Well you're lucky I know such things." he grinned at me as I sat down on my bed.

"Wait, how _do_ you know such things?"

"I'm a vampire remember? I can read minds." the second he finished his sentence my stomach dropped. How much had he seen in my mind? I didn't want him to know everything I know and feel. "Ha-ha doesn't worry! I don't read your mind all the time, only for the _important_ stuff."

"You did it again! Stop it!" I yelled and almost fell off my bed.

"Only because I knew you were going to react like that and I wanted to see what you would think when I told you I could read minds."

For the next few hours until I fell asleep we talked about the differences between vampires and werewolves along with some things that they can do. I learned that vampires can shape shift at will but the smaller the animal the person shifts into the more powerful they are and vice versa. A werewolf of course can only shift into a wolf but the things he can do as a human can also be passed on into the wolf; say if I can read minds as a human I can also read minds as a wolf.

And so on.

"Well I think I should get back to my hotel room before…" he looked out the window. "I'll see you tomorrow."

"What is it about being out after dark here? I know there are rogue vampires but what's the big deal-" I asked and turned to the window for an answer but Richard was gone leaving cold air flowing through my window.

"I wonder where dad is." I said to an empty room and I fell asleep before my head hit the pillow.

Forgot to close the window.

Heat from the sunlight pouring into my room tickled my skin waking me up from a deep sleep. Richard was already sitting in my computer chair examining me as I got up and rubbed my eyes.

"Good morning Jason."

"Morning Richard." I said slowly while stretching and sliding off the bed.

"Your father is finally home."

"Really? When did he get home and how do you know?"

"Jason, I'm a vampire. I can read minds and sense certain things if I concentrate on them."

"Show off." I snorted striding out the door.

"You know, you could too if you had the right training." Richard suggested popping out of nowhere as I pulled and dropped a box of cereal from the cupboard.

"How do you pop out of nowhere like that? And are you suggesting that you teach me to read minds and other stuff vampires do?" I scooped up the pieces of cereal that exploded out of the box off the counter and dropped them into the garbage by the fridge.

"That's another thing vampires are good at, and yes I am suggesting teaching you how to do such things."

"You still think I'm capable of things vampires do despite the fact that I'm a raging werewolf?" I laughed at the thought of being a raging werewolf.

"Jason, you have vampire blood in you. We both know this much even if you won't admit-"

"How do I have vampire blood in me if I'm a werewolf? I don't understand why everyone thinks I'm so special!" the bowl I was holding that was also full of milk and cereal had lost some of its contents when I dropped it into the table.

"Jason! You know damn well you have vampire blood in you! Everyone knows it because of your eyes. Haven't you noticed that wolves tend to have slits like cat eyes and vampires full pupils? Yet somehow you have vampire eyes but morph into a wolf." he stepped back from the table the second he finished in fear I might throw the bowl of cereal through his head.

"At first I thought that was kind of cool and all, thinking that I was different to everyone else. But now I realize that I want to just be full werewolf and not some weird mixed breed." I brought my hands up to my face as I plopped down in my chair feeling it crack a little.

"Don't be this way. Being different isn't bad, or what you said, weird. A wise man once told me 'Weird is good, strange is bad, and odd is when you don't know which to call someone. Weird is the same as different, which is the same as unique, so weird is good.' So you see, you being different can only mean good things." he now took a seat opposite me, staring into my eyes.

"Well then why hasn't anything good come of this _being different_ or _weird_? I killed someone on my first day, I changed into something I thought was only in books, the body of Drake ended in my bathtub with a message written on the mirror in his blood, Dave tried to kill my dad to get at me, and now Drake is back somehow. Tell me, out of all that, how is any of it good for me?"

For this Richard had no answer.

We sat in silence as I ate and drank the rest of my breakfast until we heard footsteps on the stairs and a groggy moaning sound.

"Hey! Look who's here, my God it's been a long time!" Dad and Richard almost lunged into each other's arms.

"By Gods it has brother! You look well, after that little attack from Dave, which I am very sorry about."

"Oh don't be silly, although I did have a bit of a scare…"

"For lords sake I hope you did! To undergo such a brutal beating and NOT be scared would be insanity, which I dearly hope you are not."

"You two speak to each other like we were back in some Victorian period in history. I'm going to get cleaned up and leave you two love birds here to sort out your life stories."

The hot shower felt unusually electric running down my bare chest. The feeling was like acid that was so hot it was cold, but it also felt good for releasing my muscles from so much tension. "Guess morphing takes a bigger toll on me then I thought it would." I muttered turning off the water and stepping out.

I stood there wondering if Richard and my Dad were still talking or if they'd taken to sitting on the couch watching TV or something.

I stepped out of the warm bathroom into the freezing cold hall way; every hair on my body stood straight up. I heard Richard and my father laughing about some old memory as I moved past the stairs.

"Hello, Jason." some deep voice said from behind me as I was in the process of pulling on my jeans. Before I had them up to my waist I was laying face down with rock hard immobile arms wrapped around mine in an iron grip so I couldn't move. I couldn't scream as the wind had been knocked out of me when I hit the floor, and my legs were just about paralyzed.

"You will listen to me and you _will_ obey me. You hear?"

I nodded with the strength I had left.

"Good. Now, we will be going somewhere to visit someone you know pretty well. You will not resist. You will not scream out to anyone. You will follow orders if they are given. And most important of all, you will not morph at any point."

Next thing I knew I was being dragged through my window in a silent graceful kidnapping. Dave was taking me somewhere to see someone I knew pretty well; but where and who?

Dave dragged me through the neighborhood as the immature morning sun shown upon the world in a bright rage. I wondered if anyone would notice a grown man dragging a young boy down the street, and I also wondered why Dave wasn't burning up in this sunlight.

When we came to the edge of the subdivision where the highway started, Dave blind folded me and tied my arms and legs together. "Necessary precautions." Next I was thrown onto his shoulder and he ran harder and faster than any car. Cold air hit my body like icicles but the morning sun warmed me up quickly.

"Do _not_ move." Dave said resting me against a cold slimy surface of some kind.

"As I if I could move."

"Don't be a smart ass."

I couldn't exactly see or move to evaluate my surroundings, so I had to rely on hearing and smell to find out exactly where I was while Dave messed with what sounded like some kind of keypad.

The place I sat I predicted was against some brick wet and cold brick wall down some random alley somewhere in Toronto. The alley smelled of rotten meat, something that died days ago, soured milk, sitting water that most likely mixed with something else over the past week, and that nasty damp smell. The heat didn't help anything, even though we were in the shade, the heat just made things smell worse.

"Get up you."

"If you haven't noticed your own crafty knots then you might want to look at them to know I can't MOVE!" I yelled putting more emphases into the last word.

Dave grabbed me under the arms and within a split second pulled me up and had my back slammed against the wall with a soft splash of nasty water hiding in the wall.

"Don't you ever try to undermined me again you ungrateful little-"

"Leave him be David!" some deep voice commanded from behind Dave.

"Yes, sir." Dave let his grip relax and pulled me down so my feet lay flat on the concrete.

In the next few second I has another pair of hands fighting off Dave's to hold me up. These hands were gentle yet strong. This new person I imagined to be a short bulky man held me like a baby peeing out in front of himself as he turned and moved forward. I could feel warm air flow through an open door with every step this man took.

"But sir," Dave paused for a second surely having a mental battle with himself whether to tell this man holding me what was on his mind or not. "Don't EVER call me David again!" and there was a whoosh of air and footsteps then Dave was gone, leaving me in the hands of some unknown man.

Literally.

"My lord, what did Dave do to you?" the man spoke with a soft tone.

"Can't you see what he did to me? I'm all taped up!" I couldn't help but let out a bit of frustration.

"Yes, I see. We must get you out of this predicament. Ben will you come here." the man called out and his voiced vibrated through space, meaning wherever I was, it was big.

"Y-yes?" Ben answered. He sounded a lot like my father…

"Dad?"

"How about we get you out of all this tape then we can all talk alright? Sound good?"

Then for the next few minutes which felt like hours the two men set to unraveling all the tape that Dave used to bind my legs and arms. I yelped every time they pulled a strand off for they also pulled some hair off with every piece.

"Welcome, Jason, to my lab." after having the blind fold removed I could see who was talking- Mr. Que from school, dressed in black with a white over coat and my father wearing the same attire standing right next to him.

"Dad? Why are you here?"

"Your father is working for me. If you would like I will give you a tour of what your father, Dave, and I have been working on." Mr. Que motioned for my father to move ahead of him.

Mr. Que moved beside my father and whispered something in his ear. Next thing I hear a heavy clash of metal hitting metal and hundreds upon hundreds of giant bright as the sun lights explode light over a an underground facility.

"What is this place? It's well half the size of Toronto!"

"I told you my boy, it's my lab. Now look down there and tell me what you see."

As I moved to the edge of the platform I noticed staircases on either side of this thing, and my father just standing in the shadows silent as the wind.

The facility was huge to say the least. Giant human sized test tubes were filled with bluish green water. The closer I tried to focus the more I began to notice; people were in those glass tubes, more men with white overcoats wondered around with clip boards scratching things down.

"What kind of experiments do you do in this lab?" I felt kind of scared, angry, and goose bumps flowed over my body but nonetheless, I was intrigued.

"I was waiting for you to ask that, follow me." Mr. Que said making a giant grin. I could see my father in the background shaking his head at the ground.

I followed behind Mr. Que, staring more at the short steel steps then taking in my surroundings. From what I could hear, besides the sound of my own footsteps, were a many more hurried footsteps and much moaning- or gurgling.

"Sir! Sir." a man in black and a white overcoat exclaimed running up to Mr. Que in a huff.

"Yes? Yes? What means do you have for interrupting me?" Mr. Que said very impatiently.

"Number-25 has escaped." the man sounded scared as he said this.

"What?" Mr. Que yelled. He grabbed the scientist and shook the life out of the man, leaving him pale and weak after the storm or forced seizures. Next Mr. Que waddled quite briskly among the rows of giant human chambers full of green water.

The huge circular chambers were made of very thick glass and held one person, each drowned in clear green water with a barrage of air bubbles fighting to find the surface. Stuck to supposed front of the chamber was a onyx colored slate with the person's name, age, date of birth-and death, a digital clock ascending and another clock descending. The person inside was more or less nude; with the exception of undergarments.

"Jason." my father gripped my shoulder and forced me around to face him.

"Dad? What's going on here? Why are these people in these chambers?"

"Jason. Run; run now before it's too late. Go now, I left the door unlocked for you."

"Dad…"

"Go! I'll hold off Que before he realizes you're gone." So that's what I did.

My brain wasn't working. It was like all time had slowed down to a stop, besides Mr. Que's angry yells and his scientists pitiful apologies in the background. My father stood in front of me telling me to run and get out of here. But why? Will I ever find any kind of straight answer in this upside down world that I've been forced into?

"I will see you tonight. Now go!" he gave me one final shove and I made my choice: run.

No one stood in my way; as everyone that worked in this human playing God lab were cowering at their bosses feet begging for forgiveness. The distance from where I stood before Mr. Que ran off to where the stairs stood was only about twenty yards, yet in this situation the distance felt like running a football field. The closer I came to the metal stairs the dimmer the yelling of Mr. Que became, which relieved me as my only goal at this second in life became getting away from that man who played God in this place.

Slamming the door behind me I stopped to take a breather. The damp disgusting smell of the alleyway flooded my nostrils making it harder to calm my breathing.

"Hey!" someone yelled to my right. The bright sun above blinded me before I could get a glimpse of who had yelled at me. Thinking Dave might have stuck around to make sure no one, or even me, got out, I bolted in the opposite direction.

The harder I pushed myself the more claustrophobic my heart became. My breath shortened greatly. My legs felt like mush underneath me. My brain clouded.

_Jason! It's us, don't run anymore. You're safe now._ It was James.

"James?" I said turning around to see if it really was him.

"Yes." and that was Katie's voice!

"Jason, what's the matter?" Richard too!

I dropped against the wall to my left and slid down to a sitting position, once again trying to calm myself.

"Why are you out here all alone and what were you running from?" Richard asked kneeling beside me.

"Get me out of here first." and not a second later I blacked out.

"Guys, he's waking up!" a high pitched croaked yell reverberated throughout my head.

"Be quit Katie, he's probably not going to like you so much for yelling right in his ears…" James said just soft enough so I could hear.

"James is right. Something had him running for his life and pass out, and yelling inches from his face isn't the greatest thing for him when he comes to." Richard had an answer to everything.

"H-hey.. Guys.." Oh the pain surging through my head. Nothing happened in that lab that could possibly make my head pound like this. It felt like my head was a ripped up old building being demolished by dynamite and a wrecking ball.

"If it hurts to speak then be silent. We'll wait until you're ready." then all went quiet.

The silence was golden. A cooling soft rain over my hot swelling brain. I opened my eyes expecting to see three figures sitting somewhere within the place I lay comfortable as a king, and sunlight pouring through my window. I was wrong.

Although the room I lay in a room which was black as the night sky I could still see about seven figures. I noticed about three of them; Richard, James, and Katie. The others I didn't know.

"Jason." an unfamiliar voice spoke.

"Yes?" I said with ease, which surprised me. Maybe it was dark because I had slept since the last time I tried to speak.

"Where do you think you are?"

"I have no idea where I am, but I hope its home."

"You are not at home. You are in the room of a friend of yours and-"

"Why? Whose?" I cut the unfamiliar voice off. Come to think it of it, I couldn't even see the other three figures; they were mere shadows in the darkness.

"Mary Warren has offered to put you up for a few days while we investigate your home." I could see the three figures starting to be distorted which made me guess they were leaving, but I wasn't about to let them go just yet.

"What do you mean investigate my home?"

"You will know in due time. Goodbye." and the figures vanished into the pure darkness.

"What was that about?" I asked to anyone who would answer, although I knew Richard would have an answer.

"Well, to be honest, none of us know. They kind of just came out of nowhere and without warning. Not even I could tell you who they were, but what I can tell you is what they were doing here." he took a long pause before continuing. "Apparently there is some kind of national threat to both humans and creatures of the night. As I've come to know and understand there are a few groups here in the area. A rogue group of vampires, the Covenant- you remember the men in black, no doubt Dave has told the family our whereabouts and are either here or on their way, the specimens your headmaster is so called perfecting, and the invisible people who were just here-there's no doubt in my mind there are more of them. And with all these groups living in the same place the tensions between the groups begin to rise. Also with our family getting involved, I doubt in the slightest that they'll leave everyone else well alone. And then we have you."

"Me?"

"Yes, you. You are a very valuable figure in this whole fiasco."

"From being both vampire and werewolf." I sighed feeling depressed and responsible for some of what has been happening.

"Precisely, and I'm sure you're wondering why."

"I am, but not really all that worried right now. What I am worried about is where mom and dad are; if I'm here, and the house is being "investigated" where are they? And why was dad working in Mr. Que's lab, or if that was a clone, where is my real dad?"

"Your mother is staying in my room at the hotel. As for your father, I don't know his whereabouts yet."

This was concerning news to me. What if dad was one of Mr. Que's minions, and now I think about it why was Dave working with him too?

"Did you know Dave was working with Mr. Que?"

"He is? That's… very strange."

"Hey, I don't mean to interrupt, but I was wondering if our plans were still happening?" Katie said out of nowhere.

"Ah your adventure into the abandoned house, well that's a question for sleeping beauty here." Richard said.

"What time is it?" I asked, and without warning a curtain was pulled back and light poured into the room revealing three of my friends sitting opposite the end of the bed and Richard to my right. "Thanks for that Richard, could have given me some warning." I covered my eyes with my arm. "So where's Mary?"

"She's downstairs with her mom making some snacks for us." James sounded excited to mention food.

I sat up in the bed and looked out the window. The sun was still bright but on its way down. That didn't really give me a time, but it was better than being stuck in a dark room with no sense of what hour it was.

"Hey." Mary said walking in the room with a platter of crackers, cheese, and little baloney circles. "How are you?" she asked after putting the platter on the end of the bed. James immediately started making little cracker sandwiches.

"Aside from being as confused as I ever could be up to this point, I'm fine."

"James, would you stop being such a fat ass!" Katie said hitting James on the shoulder. I laughed and sat up to make myself a cracker sandwich.

"So James, have you guys already had the scrimmage?"

"Unfortunately. You were nowhere to found this afternoon so we had to go on without you. Coach said he wants you to come to tomorrow's game anyway so he can meet you." James said in between bites.

"I can do that." I agreed with a nod. "Say, I have a question."

"For me?" James asked.

"Yeah, if you guys play soccer as wolves too, how does that work if some of you guys can't morph yet?"

"Well, it's interesting, I'll tell you that." He shoved a whole cracker sandwich in his mouth and continued, "It's a really safe game, mostly played in a closed space underground, kind of like a human's indoor soccer place. Now being safe doesn't include the grudges that develop and the fights that break out, sometimes ending in the death of someone." Everyone stared at James.

"You say wolves kill other wolves?" Richard asked.

"Yes. It doesn't happen a lot, but when it does, there's no stopping them."

"You creatures are just as bad as humans." Richard said laughing.

The next few hours went on like this; eating, talking, and joking. None of us seemed to have any kind of worry whatsoever, just friends and some family sitting around a living room chatting. Why couldn't this be my life; playing soccer, hanging out with friends, and all this vampire werewolf stuff staying within the pages of fiction books?

A phone rang a few times before James dug it out of his pocket. "Hello? You are? Alright, thanks."

"Who was that?" Katie asked.

"That was Mike, he said the rest of the group minus us just got to the house." he answered then looked at me, "And they were wondering when we were going to start heading that way?"

Richard was the one to answer this time. "Well if you decide to still go, I'll come as a precaution."

I nodded at him and stood up. "Well? Let's go summon us some spirits!"

The ride to the abandoned house was rather quiet. We rode in James's car, Katie in front, Mary and I in the back. Every so often I caught Mary looking my way, and I couldn't help but smile. It made me happy that someone liked me, but I had my eyes set on someone else now, although I've only seen her once.

As we pulled up into the graveyard we all kind of moved to the edge of our seats as we saw three giant wolves prowling around a man who stood in a stance ready to attack, or defend himself. When James stopped and we got out, I noticed it was Richard who was being circled. The guys must not remember him.

"Guys, it's okay! He's my uncle!" I yelled running into the circle.

Two of them morphed back to humans, Mike and Brandon. The third one, a light chocolate brown wolf sat down and turned its head at us. I had no idea who this third wolf was, although I could make a guess.

"Is that Noah?" I asked walking over to scratch his head.

"Yeah, he morphed just he noticed your uncle come up." Mike answered, and then looked apologetically at Richard, "Sorry, Richard, we didn't think who you might be. Instinct just took over, you understand?"

Richard nodded and shaking his hands at Mike, "It's quite all right."

"Awe, Noah is such a cute looking wolf!" Katie squealed running up to him and putting his head.

"So can we do this with him being a wolf?" James asked.

"We should be able to. As long as he's able to blow out his candle, doesn't matter who lights it." Mary answered.

After this confrontation we made our way into the house, Richard staying outside for protection in case an undesirable person shows up. The house was very run down; pieces of wood making up the walls had holes rotting away in them, the doors were either blasted inward or just anywhere to be seen, and dust covered everything whether it could be seen or not.

The stairs gave us the most excitement. I didn't know if Noah quite knew how to speak through his mind yet or not, because he pushed us out of his way before we headed up the stairs, he wanted to go first. Half way up the stairs his front paws struck a weak board and he almost fell through if Mike and Brandon hadn't grabbed a hold of him. He then jumped to the top and looked around just as the rest of us had helped each other over the new hole.

We made base in a far room to the right of the stairs. When Katie opened the curtains the moon shone brightly into the room. "It's a full moon guys."

"Really, why didn't we notice it on the way here?" James asked.

"Well there are a bunch of clouds out there, so maybe that's why." Katie answered taking a candle from Mary and sitting down.

The seven and us sat in a circle holding our candles, but something didn't feel right. "Aren't we suppose to have more people for this?" I asked remembering what Mary had said at the barbeque a few days ago, "We light 13 candles…."

"Well usually light thirteen, but seeing as how not everyone could make it, I'm guessing, we have seven." Mary answered.

"Of course, because thirteen is an evil number and seven being a good number, it should still work right?" Brandon pointed out.

"So I'm thinking. So who's going first?" Mary asked to the group.

"I have a good story." James announced. "It's rather graphic so if any of you are squeamish," he nudged Brandon's arm, "You might want to not listen."

"Oh shut up, James. Just tell the damn story." Brandon blurted shoving James back.

"Okay, okay." James made a fake coughing sound as if to clear his throat but stopped when he realized no one was laughing. "Well it's an urban legend, but it's still a good story. There was once this guy who was diagnosed to be insane and was to be taken into custody before he could do anymore damage.

"When his psychiatrist came back into his office though, his patient was gone; jumped out the window on the third floor. The psychiatrist could only guess he was headed home, but when he picked up the phone in his office the patient popped out from under the desk with a pair of scissors."

"Did he kill the psychiatrist?" Katie asked clenching her candle.

"Yes, Katie, he slit the psychiatrists throat." He paused to see Katie squeal slightly. "Now, the patient left the building before the police could show up, and headed home. Once there he murdered his whole family, no one knows why, but he did.

"Now before he could flee the scene, a bunch of cops got him. He was shut in jail for the rest of his life, or say they thought. He broke out about five years later and hid in the woods outside Toronto. One night, much like tonight actually, a group of teenagers went on an adventure into the woods and found a small hut with smoke coming from the chimney. These teenagers decided they were going to hunker down for the night and maybe even have some "fun". A few weeks later, a hiker found four bodies skinned and hanging from the side of the house."

"Did he go to the police?" Katie asked.

"No, he thought they were some kind of animal native to the area."

"Damn, that was more boring than playing checkers with my grandmother!" Brandon joked punching James in the arm.

"Oh really, well lets here you tell better!" James yelled even though Brandon was right next to him.

"Okay, so have you guys heard about the surgeon who invited people over for dinner?"

"Was he the one who would tie people down to the table and practice his surgery on them?" Mike asked.

"You just had to ruin it didn't you, Mike!" Brandon yelled at him. The rest of us laughed.

The next hour or so went generally the same, and when the last person told their story, minus Noah and me, we all blew out our candles. For the next few minutes we all kind of stared at each other in confusion on whether something was going to happen or not.

The moonlight poured through the glass panes and an unknown wind suddenly swept through the room. The windows flew open and slammed into the walls, the glass breaking on impact. A black kind of vapor swirled in the middle of our circle until it took on a human shape with red eyes.

"Jason." It said.

Everyone looked at me in bewilderment. No one knew what was happening, least of all me.

"Y-Yes?"

"Do you recognize my voice?" it asked.

Recognize its voice? What the hell was that suppose to mean?

"You know what it means. Remember!"

I searched my mind for any answer to what this thing was asking from me. Do I remember a voice? A voice! It's not dads, nor Mr. Que's, or even Dave's…

Wait!

"Yes, that's right. You know now."

The voice that spoke to me a few times when I first moved here!

"And you now know what you are, as well as accepted it. I can sense you have made friends with similar breeds, but you are different from-"

"I somehow have vampire in me too, I know."

"Precisely, and by now I think you also have an idea of what is to come in the near future, but not entirely the immense power which will be brought down upon your front door."

"My family wants to kill me, and I'm sure Mr. Que is on my ass now."

"You are right, but at a loss for knowledge. There are more groups along with your principal and family that will rise against one another."

"Are you implying a war of some kind?"

"Yes, and I am also here to give you my power that will increase your chances of survival."

"Wait, there's going to be-"

"Jason, I've told you what I know. Now I will shroud you in my spirit until your body absorbs my power in its entirety, then you may return to your friends."

Before I could ask what he meant by return to my friends, the swirling darkness wrapped itself around me. It felt like gravity itself was pressing down on me, and I could feel a cool sensation in every one of my billions of pores. Seconds later I flew backwards hitting the wall. My body was stretched like a starfish and I looked toward the ceiling moaning in pain as the last of the darkness was absorbed.

I opened my eyes to see Katie, Mary, and James crouching just a few inches away. Mike and Brandon were in the background holding onto Noah, who was growling like he'd seen a lion. Richard floated in through the window a few seconds later.

I had no idea what was going on, or what had just happened for that matter. All I know that I was slumped into a wall with my friends staring at me like I was some kind of freak. Did what just happen, really happen? And why did it?

My head throbbed as if someone was beating on my skull with a sledgehammer. I shut my eyes and whatever happened after that I would have no knowledge of.


	9. Chapter 9

Chapter 9

I opened my eyes to someone calling my name. "Castore, get off your ass and get out there!" the voice was yelling. It was the coach I hadn't met yet. He was yelling at me to go into the game currently in progress. Everyone was out there; Mike, James, Noah, Brandon, even looking in the stands I saw my mum and dad, Katie, Mary, Carly, and Richard.

"Come on Castore, this is the championship, not some half assed practice! Get a move on!" he yelled as I ran past him onto the field. The stadium we were playing in was huge, almost the size of the football stadiums in Europe.

We were playing against a team that wore purple and white. They played hard, very hard, but we had something that this purple team didn't; we were werewolves and we could speak to each other telepathically. James and I ran up the left side a few feet apart to distract the purple team from Mike's advance on the opposite side of the pitch, (all of us could hear the coach yelling about how stupid we were). As I approached the outer goal box I reached out to Mike to brace for a cross. I stopped dead and twisted, a purple defenseman tripped over his own laces trying to keep up with my movement, and crossed the ball right into Mike's chest. I ran around through the middle so a few purple players would follow, then backed off to the corner and Mike passed hard to James who put everything he had into his shot.

"The wolves win!" the commentator exclaimed over the loud speakers. He went on to comment on what a brilliant goal we scored as the replay played over and over. The crowd was wild, absolutely shameless! The team piled on the James, Mike, and me. Coach was taunting the opposing teams coach. The purple team lined up for the traditional after game hand shake. This couldn't be possible; did we just win the championship for real? But weren't we all just in the abandoned house telling ghost stories when an apparition possessed me or something?

"You can't stop us, Jason." A dark voice said over the screams and cheers of the crowd. In a split second everyone in the stadium was gone. I looked around and saw only one man sitting far up near the top. He stood up slowly, "Events have been set in motion and you cannot stop them. You will have to endure an impossible choice between what you have just experienced or die with all your friends beside you. We will come. We will wage war. No one will stand against us. No one will wake when the sun rises." The man put on a hat and took his leave.

I woke up yelling. My eyes burned as light latched itself onto my pupils. I slammed them shut and moaned.

"Oh my god, Jason, you're finally awake!" Katie squealed. She grabbed my arm and yanked me to one side so she could hug me.

"The blinds, Katie, shut them please" I pleaded waving my arm in the direction I thought was the window.

"I got it." Richard's deep voice said. Seconds later I could feel the drop in temperature as darkness cooled the room.

"Thank you." I opened my eyes to see Katie to my left, Richard on my right standing by the window, and James sitting in a chair opposite the bed. "Where is everyone else?"

"Your mother is at home and not allowed to leave, my orders." Richard scoffed.

"And the rest of the group went home." James said standing up, "I told them Katie and I got this."

"So, we're going to order some food and then I hope you'll indulge my curiosity about what you saw last night in that house." Richard walked over to pick up the phone in the hotel room.

I looked down at myself, "Uh, where are my clothes?"

"They're in the bathroom" Katie giggled, "Don't be so shy, you've got _nothing_ to by afraid of."

"Shit, Katie, really?" James exclaimed.

"Wanna grab me a towel, James?"

"Sure, I'd love to!"

After I put my clothes on we all sat around waiting for room service to bring breakfast up. Richard ordered full platters for all of us, and considering how expensive hotels usually are, I still wondered where Richard got his money. Eggs, sausage, bacon, croissants, toast, and some chocolate cake we were all ready for a weekend long nap.

"So, about what happened last night?" Richard asked.

"Ugh, don't give a guy a few minutes to breath do you." I took a minute to get comfortable on the bed, "Okay, some kind of apparition appeared and spoke to me then sort of went into me."

"What did it say to you?"

I looked at him darkly, "A war was coming. And from the dream I just had, I think the family is the one waging it."

"Yes, yes they will be here eventually." Richard didn't seem to worried about this at the current moment, but if I knew him at all, I knew he was thinking a million things at once. "Tell me a little more about this dream you had".

"Uh, well," I paused for a moment to relive the event I dream about; "It was a football game, soccer, in a huge stadium. Everyone was there, we won the game and then everyone disappeared except for one old man at the top of the stands. He spoke to me; said I will have to make an impossible choice and winning that championship game was the outcome of one choice, but at the cost of losing lives back at home."

"Holy shit, did you just say championship game? Like, the championship? The World Cup of high school soccer?"

I stared at James as he excitedly spat questions at me, "I guess, yeah. It was a championship game against some team wearing purple."

"Oh my god!" James yelled.

"Chill out, James, don't act like Angelina Jolie just walked in her naked." Katie joked.

"No, seriously, do you not know who the Saints are?"

Again I stared at him, "Obviously I do not."

"Dude! The Stillwater Saints are the best high school soccer team in North America!"

"Okay let's calm down a bit, James, you can get over excited if his dream actually happens." Katie insisted.

"Katie is right, we have more pressing matters at hand," Richard said coldly, "But on the other hand, maybe a little excitement is what we all need right now."

James's phone started ringing and he got up to take it in the bathroom. I sat on the bed looking out the window, Katie sat in the chair next to the bed with her feet on the bed staring at the wall, and Richard seemed lost in his own mind. Minutes passed in silence as if hell itself was going to come bursting through the hotel room door and we were just waiting for it to consume us.

"Speaking of excitement, I think your friend has some good news." Richard reported as James came out of the bathroom.

"So Mike just called and said coach is still interested in seeing how we work as a team. He knows about the event last night, but the guys told him you lost consciousness and fell out of the second story window, so he's not expecting anything spectacular." James stated.

"Doesn't he know we're werewolves and we heal fast?" I asked.

"Yeaaaaah… he's a bit soft when it comes to injuries. He knows we heal fast and can be on our feet in minutes after a broken limb, but he believes we should still rest. Other than that, he's a real hard ass."

"I guessed as much from my dream."

"Maybe you can tell us a little more about it on the way to practice? We kind of need to head over soon. Like, really soon."

"You okay with that, Richard?" I asked looking at him.

He smiled and ruffled my hair, "My nephew being surrounded by a team of hormonal teenage werewolves, why should I be worried. I'll meet you at your house when it's done."

I wasn't even there ten minutes before John started throwing his weight around, literally. I walked onto the pitch to take my first try out position, defense, when John thought he would prove his dominance by throwing his shoulder in me as I passed him. The move seemed to hurt him more than do what he planned.

"_James, is John not one of us?" _I asked through our minds.

"_We're not sure if he is and hasn't morphed yet, or if he's a vampire, or… if he's just a human playing with dogs." _He replied.

"_He doesn't smell right to me. I can't pinpoint it, but I think I've smelled that scent somewhere else." _

Before he could reply the ball was flying in my direction, and John steamrolling down the field to catch up. I bumped it with my chest to gain control and lob it back to the middle for someone to take it. As soon as the ball hit the ground and I swung my leg around to lay into it, John body slammed me into the turf. His eyes were bright red and he stood over me a second before taking the ball to our goal.

"John, what in the hell was that?!" coach yelled.

"Just playing some hard soccer, coach!" John yelled back.

"That's illegal soccer you jackass! Don't you ever run down your own teammate like that again or I'll have you suspended from play. You got that?"

"Yes, sir!"

"And Castore, when you're knocked down, do NOT just lay there like a little chicken shit! Get up and run him down. It is after the job of the defenseman to, oh I don't know, DEFEND?!"

"Yeah, got it coach!" I got back to my feet.

"Jesus H. Christ, do I have a bunch of misfits this year… Again! And I want to see some skill, this isn't American football."

"_James, his eyes were glowing red. He's not right, whatever he is."_

"_Maybe he's a pureblood vampire? I've heard they do that sometimes." _

_ "I don't know, but I'm not going to let him knock me on my ass ever again." _

The rest of the match played on with John trying to run down his teammates, not just me, which earned him a one way ticket to the locker room after he broke Noah's wrist. I was played in many different positions and coach finally decided I would be placed on defense with Tyler, and moved to forward when things were tough. A few other guys got moved around a bit as well, but it didn't seem to bother them to play different positions from what they were used to.

"Who do you think you are, Castore? Think you can come in here and take over my team?" a voice sneered behind me, followed by a heavy fist into the empty locker beside me. I turned to see John scowling inches from my face. I could hear his heart-beat, smell what he had for lunch, and feel the rage pumping through his veins. _Great, just what I need._

"I didn't come here to take over, John. I just moved here and since I used to play football in England, I thought maybe I would play it here too. That's all." Try to stay calm, don't need another Drake incident.

"Well you can bet your crooked British teeth that you aren't going anywhere here. This is MY team, and as long as I'M captain, I will own you."

"John, leave the kid alone. You don't want him to maul your head off, do you?" coach called from his office.

"I would love to see him try!" John yelled back. He looked at me and his eyes were glowing red again. He pulled his hand out of the locker next to mine, completely wrenching the entire box off the wall.

"Oh for the love of god, John, do you REALLY have to destroy the god damn school property? Now I have to fill out a shit ton of paper work and…" he cut off as he slammed the door to his office.

This was going to be a fun year if things kept like this, along with everything else that's going to happen. Guess I better just have some fun while waiting for Dr. Frankestien to unleash his army against the Adam's family, the men in black, the rogue Krograns, and the entire Starfleet academy here. A fun year indeed.


	10. Chapter 10

Chapter 10

"You alright, Jason?" James asked running to catch up to me leaving the school.

"I'm just peachy. I've got a family who wants to kill me, a principal that wants to kill me, rogue vampires that want to kill anything they can, I thought the football team would be the least of my worries, but now John also wants to kill me."

"Okay, you're not okay, I get it. I'm sorry, but you know what would make you feel better?"

"I don't see what could possibly make me feel better after what just happened in the locker room."

James looked away and stared into the setting sun, seconds later Mike, Noah, Brandon, and Tyler came our way. He must have called them without me hearing. "We're a soccer team, I'm sure there are a couple ways we can turn that frown upside down. C'mon!"

We all squeezed into James' mustang; thankfully I got shotgun and Mike, Noah, Brandon, and Tyler somehow managed to fit in the back. I'm pretty sure they had to sit on one another, but none of them would admit it if asked. As we rode down the high way James put on some mix tape that involved Theory of a Deadman, Three Days Grace, and for some ungodly reason, Spice Girls. "Just.. don't ask…" James said when I did ask. Either way we were all soon singing at the top of our lungs. Just a bunch of guys smooshed into a tiny muscle car singing as loudly and out of tune as possible, laughing every few minutes; what could be better?

James pulled into the parking lot of the mall and I followed them down to the street and across. The place looked like a general store, like so many others in downtown Toronto, but with one difference; there was a club underneath.

"You'll soon notice this isn't like every other club." James slapped my shoulder and shoved me down the stairs leading to the club.

From the very first impression it seemed like any club one might think of; loud music, colored lights beaming in every direction, and people dancing on a lighted checkerboard dance floor. The further in I moved the more I noticed this was different. People were performing magic either to show off or as a profession to earn money, I couldn't tell. There were werewolves brawling in one corner with many spectators betting. In another corner were vampires drinking blood from various containers. Then of course there were the dancers and the band; not much out of the ordinary there unless you can ignore the oddly shaped forms and some people sprouting wings and horns.

"What the hell is this place?" I asked, amazed.

"Welcome to Night Life, the only place around where it's always night and all sorts are welcome."

Mike shoved between us, "Heads up guys, we've been noticed" Mike warned pointing to a trio of wolves heading our way.

"You," the leader boomed poking me in the chest, "You have the wolfs blood, yet you smell of _death_."

"Hey, guys, we don't want any trouble. Our friend has just had a rough few days and we brought him here for some fun to clear his head." James said wedging himself between the leader and me.

The leader growled at James, "You puny little pup, you think I care what you have to say?" and without warning the leader slammed a giant fist into the center of James' chest, sending him flying backwards onto the floor.

"Hey!" I yelled, and lashed out at the leader. My hand turned into the paw of a wolf before impact, my claws dug deep into the side of his face. I then braced myself for the leader and his pack to jump on me.

"You little shit," the leader snarled. "You've just scarred me! Into the ring with you! I will destroy you…" the leader turned and pushed his way through to the corner where werewolves were brawling.

"Well shit, I did not expect this to happen." James laughed coming back to my side.

"You're not actually serious about fighting him are you?" Mike asked from behind us.

"What choice do I have now? Besides, I'm not just wolf remember, I should have some tricks up my sleeve." I laughed, but it was a regretful laugh. What have I gotten myself into?

"Right, well let's hope the vampire side of you actually has some power instead of just being a lazy blood drinker." Brandon joked.

"If anything goes wrong, you know we have your back. I don't think they can do math very well, but there's three of them and six of us." James said and looked around. Tyler and Noah had vanished, "Well, we still outnumber them by one."

Everyone cleared the corner to watch this big bad wolf fight a small high school dog. The music changed, more people gathered around, and bets were flying around the crowd.

"Let's go smallfry!" the leader growled and pounced forward, slamming me into the ground. I morphed as he started to claw at me, marking the ground as I dodged his blows. I held him up at arm's length and rolled my legs under and kicked up. He flew into the ceiling and dropped with a hard thud.

"Ooooooh, that looked like it hurt! The new kid's got some moves!" the DJ yelled over the sound system.

The leader got back to his feet and lunged at me again. This time I turned my side to him and dropped my weight, forcing him to hit me and topple over onto the other side. It was my turn to pounce. I jumped on him and held him down with all four paws, then dug my teeth into his neck, drawing blood. His body twitched underneath me as I drained the blood from his neck.

His two other pack members bounded into me, forcing me to sprawl into the crowd. I morphed back to human and bolted into the dancers. I could sense more than two people trying to chase me. God this wasn't good.

_"James! Mike! Brandon? Noah? Tyler! Anyone!?" _I reached out to my friends.

"_Go, we're right behind you!"_ Tyler replied, and I felt a pushed on my back.

The entire club seemed in an uproar now. People were trying to stop me to congratulate me on defeating Shawn. Others were trying to lash out at me, hissing as I went by, none of them actually wanting to strike me. The vampires who were drinking blood lazily earlier were now standing, giving me thumbs up and started moving throughout the club.

We reached the surface and backed into a nearby alley to wait for the rest. The door to the general store opened and Noah and Tyler went around the corner to check out who was coming out. Seconds after they turned the corner they were thrown backwards into the brick wall by a large cloud of fire. I ran to the opening to see who caused this. No one was there.

I turned around to see if my friends were okay and they too were missing, mere seconds after being thrown into the wall and now they were gone. What was happening? Who was doing this?

"All in due time." A voice came from behind me. I turned and saw no one, smelled no one, but I could sense a presence. The sense came a little too late though. There was a cold prick in the back of my neck and my entire body felt frozen in minutes. I lost consciousness soon after.

I could hear whispers, but not with my ears. I could feel the whispers, as if they were in my head, tickling the axons of my brain. They were telling me things, or trying to anyway. There were images too; images of other people, of actions, plans, blueprints. I didn't know what any of it meant until there was a violent surge of electricity flowing through and around my body.

I lashed out in pain and involuntary muscle contractions. My eyes opened but everything was blurry. There was water, cold water, and bubbles. I was in a tank!

"Ah, look who finally woke up." Someone said outside the tank, but I couldn't make out who or what it was.

"Awe, you don't seem too happy to see me. After all the fun we had last time, I thought you might like a little swim."

I was in Mr. Que's lab, in one of his tanks. I was one of his test subjects now. But how? How could he have gotten a hold of me? I wondered if anyone at the club could have worked for him.

"You son of a bitch!" I gurgled through the oxygen mask.

"Give him another dose, I want to test out the new serum on him as soon as possible." Within seconds I was fast asleep again.

The next time I woke, I woke on a freezing metal table. There were metal and leather straps holding me down, and to make things easier an IV drip which cause me to still be just drowsy enough not to focus.

"Alright then, Jason" Mr. Que said, picking up and flicking a rather long slim needle, "This will hopefully give you a little more juice to add to that already impressive power grid you got going on." And with that he started inserting and pushing the clear liquid into my body.

The pain was excruciating! It felt like every nerve in my body was on fire, every cell in my body exploding, imploding, and rearranging themselves. I lashed out the best I could, but the IV drip was still fogging my brain. I all was crystal clear about was pain. Pain and the rage heat that surged through my body.

Some minutes later the pain and heat subsided and I stopped lashing out. "Knock him out." Mr. Que commanded his fellow scientist.

"Jason! Jason! Jason!" a voice yelled over and over and over. It was getting really annoying. I really need to come up with some anti-losing consciousness device.

I opened my eyes to see Katie shaking me once again. Why was it always Katie to wake me up? Was everyone else to afraid?

"Guys, he's awake!" she squealed.

"What happened to you, man?" Mike asked coming forward.

"I…" what did happen to me? I was outside the club with Noah and Tyler when they got attacked then I blacked out. "I don't know. Where's Noah and Tyler, are they okay?"

"Could be better, but we're alright." Tyler's voice came from the background. Noah grunted in response.

"Were you kidnapped by my father?" a new voice asked. A blonde girl came forward from the left.

"Your father? Who's your father?" I asked sitting up against the wall. We were in the abandoned house.

"Jason, this is Rose. She says you too have met before at school." Katie snorted.

"In the front office, I introduced myself as Clary, it's the name my mom calls me but I prefer my middle name, Rose."

"You had brown hair and green eyes if I remember right, how come you look so different?"

"I dyed my hair brown last year and I decided I wanted to be blonde again, and the green was because of my contacts, my eyes are naturally blue though."

She was much more beautiful this way. The blonde hair and blue eyes suited her much better. And the way her hair fell over her face, gave her an almost cat like look.

"So who's your father?" James asked, making his presence known. I must still be under the drug's effects because I didn't even know he was there.

"The male principal, Charlie Que."

"So your name is CRQ? That's interesting initials." James said.

"You're more interested in her initials then what she just said?" Katie asked, glaring at him.

"I think he's interested in more than her initials." Tyler laughed.

"Very mature, Tyler!" James started going red.

"I'm sorry to say boys I already have my eye on someone." Rose answered.

"So back to the issue at hand, can you remember anything about what my father did to you?" Rose asked.

"I don't remember anything, I'm afraid."

"Nothing, nothing at all?"

Just then, as if on cue, I felt the heat and pain surge through my body. "AAAAAAHHHHH!" I screamed. I lashed out. I seized. My body grew hotter and hotter until it felt like the heat was leaving my body.

"Everyone get out!" James yelled.

I felt fire eat away my clothes, and lick at my skin. The flame didn't hurt me from the outside, but it did begin to swallow the wooden floors and wall behind me, and as the floorboards burned away I fell. The flame started out as an orange, then a blue, but now was a steady green color, as if my body was covered in a layer of copper.

"Jason, you have to control it!" Rose screamed at me. The house was burning down and she was standing in the middle of it.

"Rose get out! The house is going to fall on you!" I yelled back waving my arms, which was a bad idea because flames flew off my arms and from my hands and started devouring the floor I was on.

Rose threw her arms out and her body engulfed itself in the same green as mine! Was she a mutant that could control fire, or was she, like me, a test subject?

"Calm your mind, Jason. Focus. Control the flame, don't let it control you!"

I listened to her. I stopped moving and focused on the flames surrounding my body. I pictured it just flickering inches from my skin. I imagined a cool flame licking my body without spreading to cause harm to anything around me. A minute later I could feel a rush of warmth surround my body at once, and I opened my eyes to see the green flame wavering on my body, not consuming what was left of the wood around me.

Rose came up and took my hand. She led me out of the house where James threw a towel to me. I would have thought it was crazy to imagine wearing a towel while my body was engulfed in flames, but I remembered Rose being on fire and her clothes not being devoured.

"Dude, I'm proud to call you my friend and all, but I have to admit you have some issues." James laughed.

"Don't be mean, James, my father has given him something he wouldn't be ready for in years. Let alone having it forced upon him along with being a wolf as well." Rose replied sounding rather annoyed.

"Hey, I didn't mean any offence by it! I was just trying to lighten the mood." James said, defeated.

"Please don't fight guys. The last thing I need right now is to step in between some ungodly battle because you two lost your cool." I growled at them both. The green flame licking my skin began to fade slowly. Rose caught sight of this and her flame disappeared instantly.

"You'll learn to control it and it will become second, or third, nature to you." Rose must have caught me looking with questionable eyes when her fire went out instantly.

"I wish I could learn it now so it wouldn't have to be a pain to everyone."

"You, a pain to us?" Tyler slammed a heavy hand on my shoulder from behind, "Think a burning building will scare us away that easily? We're a team man, and the team always sticks together."

"I wish John would act like that."

"Screw John!" James exclaimed loudly. "He doesn't deserve to be captain if he treats his players like crap."

"I don't mean to interrupt this stimulating conversation guys, but we have a stalker."

The usual tall stature of my uncle Richard came towards us. "Good evening, everyone."

"How is it you always seem to find me whenever something bad happens?" I asked.

"What, did something bad happen? I was merely going for my evening stroll." He smiled.

"Because you just go for leisurely strolls every night."

"I consider myself a sort of neighborhood watch." He paused as he moved closer to wait for Tyler to move away so he could wrap his arm around my shoulder. "So what kind of trouble have you all gotten into this time?" he asked eyeing what was left of the abandoned house, some of it was still smoldering.

"Jason here caught fire, along with his new girlfriend, Rose." Tyler scoffed. Katie shot him a look as if to say 'he's not taken yet, so shut up'.

"You didn't tell me you had an interest in a girl." Richard said squeezing my shoulder. My face felt so hot after that I couldn't tell if I was blushing or catching on fire again. But since Richard wasn't jumping away I decided I was blushing. Did I really like this girl? I just met her for the first time really.

"Well this is awkward." James sighed, scratching his head.

"Is this your dad?" Rose asked, her voice rather squeaky.

"Young lady do I look like a father?" Richard joked, but decided to correct himself. "No, I'm not his father. Although, I suppose I am old enough to be. No, I'm his uncle. Uncle Richard." He held out his hand for her to shake, but instead of pulling away after a second or two he stood there holding her hand and staring deep into her eyes.

"Richard?" I asked touching his arm. He snapped out of his trance with a shock and leaned back against my side.

"Sorry, I seemed to have got lost in thought." He said but I didn't believe a word of it, but I guess I'll find out what went through his head later. "It's very nice to meet you Rose."

"Likewise." She didn't seem very talkative at all now. Something happened when they shook hands. "I think I should be heading home now." She said and began to walk away.

"Don't be silly, I'll give you a ride. Come on Noah. See you guys tomorrow!" Tyler jogged off to his VW Passat.

"I didn't know Tyler drove." I said surprised.

"He does, he just never advertises it because he catches rides all the time." James answered. "Well, no point standing around here anymore, especially considering this place just burned down. It might be a good idea to skedaddle."

"I couldn't agree more." Katie agreed.

Back at my house, Richard and I snuck in through my bedroom window. Well, he snuck; I just kind of sat in his arms as he carried me. Said we could move more quietly as well as quickly that way.

"So what happened when you shook Rose's hand?" I asked before he even finished shutting my window. I saw down on my bed in the darkness, not daring to turn the light on incase mum noticed and decided to bring the entire British army storming into my room.

"She…" he paused to think, leaving his mouth open. What he wants to say must be hard to put into words. "She's has evil about her."

"Are you saying she's evil?"

"I'm not saying _she_'s evil. I'm just saying there's evil about her. I sensed a great darkness within her, but that could be produced by something else, something she's keeping bottled up inside."

"Well her father is Mr. Q. so I'm pretty sure that's where the evil darkness comes from. She, herself, helped me when I caught fire and burned the building down around me."

"I was going to ask about that. So you burned the house down?"

"Accidently, of course."

"How did you gain the power to produce fire?"

I sighed. "It's a long story. I'll give you the short version." I took a deep breath and started telling him briefly about our trip to the club, being captured by Mr. Q. and having something injected into me, then waking up in the house just to burn it down minutes later.

"I've heard about people controlling the elements naturally, but never having the power induced into one's own body. This is remarkable, as wrong as it may be."

"As scary as it is, I think it will come in handy. Especially if I have to fend off family members later on, I'll be like a one man angry mob."


End file.
